Today is in Catholic History the First Crusade the Siege of Antioch begins and I will share from the chronicles.
“The siege of Antioch rapidly assumed legendary status in the experience of the participants and then in the memory of Christendom. From late October 1097 until early June 1098 the crusaders, never enough to surround the city completely, laboured unsuccessfully to starve or coerce Antioch, the key to northern Syria, into surrender. Two significant relief forces were repulsed: the first, led by Duqaq of Damascus, in late December with difficulty; the second, under Duqaq’s estranged brother Ridwan of Aleppo, with surprising conclusiveness at the battle of Lake Antioch early in February.
The lack of unity among the squabbling Turkish warlords of Syria and the Jazira almost certainly saved the western host from annihilation, despite a now steady stream of reinforcements arriving from the west mainly by sea at the ports of Antioch, Latakiah and St Simeon.
Such were the constant …More