June 7, 1099: The Siege of Jerusalem begins.
The weeklong siege of Jerusalem by crusaders of the First Crusade ended in the city’s capture and the slaughtering of many of its inhabitants. The main aim of the First Crusade, which was officially launched in 1096 by Pope Urban II, was to send volunteers to aid the Byzantine Empire and help relieve the empire from the threat posed by the Muslim Seljuqs of Anatolia. Central to this goal of countering Muslim power in the region was the recapturing of Jerusalem, the holy city which had not been under the control of Christian rulers since the successful Muslim conquest of the Levant in the 7th century.
At the time of the First Crusade the Seljuq Turks had captured Jerusalem, only to lose it once more to forces of the Fatimid Caliphate shortly before the crusaders launched their siege. Their principal commanders were Raymond IV of Toulouse, Tancred, Robert Curthose, Duke of Normandy, Robert II, Count of Flanders, and Godfrey of Bouillon, who would, after the Christians took control of Jerusalem, become the first ruler (not king) of the Kingdom of Jerusalem. The siege ended when Godfrey and his brother’s men assembled siege towers by the city walls and entered Jerusalem over its defenses on June 14-15.
At the time, Jerusalem was populated by 70,000 civilians practicing a variety of faiths; when the crusaders entered the city in 1099, they unleashed a bloody massacre upon these tens of thousands. Jews sought refuge within a synagogue, which was burnt down, and Muslims were slaughtered by the thousands as well. According to the Gesta Francorum, the crusaders brought the “killing and slaying even to the Temple of Solomon, where the slaughter was so great that our men waded in blood up to their ankles….” Many of those who were not killed were either ordered to leave the city or were sold into slavery. Amidst the bloodshed, the crusaders - laymen and clergymen alike - made their way to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre to give thanks and murmur prayers.