Authors: Jack Ludlow
‘I daresay Toulouse had already sent out cutting parties to find suitable timber; I suggest, Uncle, we would be advised to do the same.’
The haste with which those Anglo-Saxon carpenters came from Antioch testified to the fact that Raymond had dug deep into his purse, for they were known to be an avaricious bunch who demanded and received high fees and they had not been idle in a recently captured city in which much required to be rebuilt, not least those mosques reconsecrated as Christian churches, places where their skill at carving was in high demand.
Like all men of their trade – only cathedral-building stonemasons were worse – they had arrogance too, which came from the knowledge that for all their fighting ability the mail-clad knights often required their skills to overcome a stout defence. Antioch had tempered that somewhat, there being only one small section of wall at which a siege tower could be used, so they had been employed in fortress building, bastions that shut access to the gates of a city near impossible to assault.
Ma’arrat an-Numan was not simple either because no tower could get close to the walls due to that deep ditch, added to which, aware of the shortage of time, Raymond was asking for a rough-hewn edifice, not some smooth example of the carpenter’s art. If they were disgruntled to be rushed they were even happier to be well paid and they demanded to be properly fed, which caused resentment in an encampment where food was now being rationed. No fool, Raymond was disbursing his money in stages to ensure he had oversight of their work, while always present in person demanding haste.
The Apulians were busy too, though eager to keep their heavy frames out of sight, buried, once constructed, under piles of brushwood. Any Provençal knight approaching their lines would see the ladders they had built of a standard size and weight, which led to amusement as they contemplated these rivals for plunder
enduring the same fate as had been visited on them. Not that their liege lord of Toulouse, or his captains, gifted them much time to gloat, for a roadway had to be made and the dry moat had to be filled in.
The place chosen was adjacent to one of the towers, which, if it told the defenders precisely where the attack would come and by what means – they could hardly avoid observing what was being constructed just out of the range of their archery – also served as a sign of the determination of the attackers to overcome them. The Muslim garrison dare not essay out to disrupt the effort: standing by was a strong force of knights to kill anyone who tried.
Just like the construction of the siege tower, the filling in of the dry moat had to be done with haste: there was no time to construct a bombardment screen as well, so Raymond’s men were obliged to cram it by running towards the wall with a shield over their head and a large stone in their one free hand, that cast at the base of the wall before they could beat a hasty retreat. It was a run for safety that some did not make, either felled by a rock themselves or caught by the burning pitch and oil the defenders cast down on their heads.
‘At least with what they are casting down,’ Bohemund said, his tone mordant, ‘the infidel are contributing to their own downfall.’
Rocks on their own did not suffice to create a crossing over which the wheels of a siege tower could move forward. Once the ditch was filled to a certain point it had to be topped by a combination of pebbles and earth. Day after day the Apulians watched as their Provençal counterparts risked being killed or maimed to make good that pathway, sometimes seeing their efforts washed away by rain, while all the time the siege tower
rose behind them, until after ten days the Count of Toulouse pronounced himself satisfied and proper preparations could be made for an assault.
Bohemund sent a message to Raymond offering to act in concert with his men and to attack any point of the walls he chose to allot to them. The reply that came back was uncivil in the extreme: he would prefer Bohemund’s men to stand and observe, but since he could not stop them if they wished to make an assault, it was a matter of indifference to him where they chose to do so.
‘I have had many occasion to regret that we are on Crusade, Tancred, and this is just another one of them. In any other place, on any other purpose and at any time, Raymond and I would have settled this dispute by a contest of arms. Bishop Adémar kept us from that while he was alive.’
‘And now his spirit does the same.’
‘Partly. But who could so throw their reputation to the wolves by engaging in battle with a fellow Crusader?’
Tempted to say that his uncle was equally at fault, Tancred, as he had done these many months, held his tongue. All around him were the sounds of men making ready for battle, swords being honed on stone wheels, mail and the straps that held it tight being checked, as well as the murmured prayers of those who would do battle in the morning, going into action immediately after they had been shriven by the accompanying priests.
It was at these times that men wondered at being in such a place at such a time, thought fondly of home and hearth, perhaps of wives and children, which was a rosy glow not tempered by the knowledge of reality. In their lives they rarely sat by a home-built fire, for they were a caste of warriors who made their way in the world by fighting,
not by tending sheep, cattle or hauling a plough along behind the fat arse of an ox.
They would attend and say Mass in the knowledge, while indifferent to the fact, that death might await them. Each man would swallow the Eucharist and the wine, which represented the body and blood of Jesus Christ, and commend his soul to God before setting out to kill any fellow man with whom he fought, and once the battle was over, to then take, in the form of anything of value, what he could from those who survived.
R
aymond was slow to start, letting dawn, the normal hour for an assault, pass by before he gave the order to form up, that extended by several more turns of sand passing through the narrow neck of glass. It was near to noontime before the first horn blew and the tower began to move, a red-backed flag with its golden Occitan cross fluttering in the stiff morning breeze. Not that it was very obvious the sun was at its zenith, hidden as it was in a grey and cloudy sky that looked to threaten rain.
Many of the stones that now filled that dry moat had come from the roadway that led to the western curtain wall – it would be madness to try to take one of the many towers, naturally higher in construction, so the siege tower was rolled slowly forward with a relative ease that decreased the closer it came to the masonry. There the pathway narrowed considerably: in the killing zone it had been harder to make it so wide and so smooth and the continued forward
motion on less than perfect ground now made the structure rock to and fro and from side to side in what looked, from a distance, to be an alarming degree.
The men who suffered most from the movement were the archers on the very top level, there to engage in an exchange with their counterparts of the walls, who started firing flaming bolts as soon as it came in extreme range, aimed at setting the less solid parts of the tower alight, especially the brushwood screens that lined each level. With Raymond’s bowman was a gigantic huntsman blowing endless loud calls on his horn to encourage his confrères and, he hoped, frighten the defence.
Below the archers and behind a solid screen were gathered the small body of knights who would undertake the initial assault, the screen when dropped acting as a platform on which they could begin a fight designed to push the defenders back onto their own parapet. With the heavily armed knights stood a quartet of lightweight
milities
whose task was to cast grappling irons upon which they would then haul in an effort to ease the task of the whole mass pushing below.
Originally, at ground level and in front of the tower, the
milities
and camp followers had been pulling on ropes, but that was abandoned as soon as the arrows began to fly. Now they were behind and pushing hard, partly screened from harm by the structure, lined up on either side of the supporting knights, ready to aid their confrères by rushing up the internal ladders to join as soon as the fighting began. That had to wait till the tower was stationary: too many bodies on the floors made it impossible to move.
Given they were pushing and the ground was less even, progress slowed until even a snail would have outrun its progress, its four great wheels creaking as it edged forward, the weight of the tower
enough on its own to send out wisps of smoke from the greased axels. Waiting along the wall was a frisson of pikes, as well as swordsmen ready to cut those grappling-iron ropes, while as soon as they came within range javelins were cast in a high arc in an attempt to draw first blood by looping over the screen.
There had been yelling from both sides, to go with that relentless horn blowing, since the tower first moved but the closer it got the louder such shouting became as men sought to bolster their courage by exhortation, until the air was filled with the combination, the cursing of both faiths now loud enough to fill the air. If Raymond could be blinded by his pride he was no tyro as a general: an attack with ladders was launched against the northern wall to split the defence. In plain sight the archers atop the tower saw some of the defenders rush off to contain that assault and they were not alone.
Bohemund was watching events with as keen an eye as his rival, just as earlier he had listened to his Armenian interpreter, Firuz, who had been sent to sniff out Raymond’s tactics and came to report the surreptitious preparations for the supplementary attack, making an assessment of when to launch his own attempt against the southern ramparts, which if they were not unguarded should have few men in place to repulse him.
‘It will not remain thus,’ were the words he had employed when he outlined his thinking to his senior captains, as dawn rose prior to the opening of the battle. ‘Raymond’s northern attack will draw off strength from his main effort but they will soon see that for what it is, a diversion.’
Canny as ever, Bohemund had held back this conference till it could be delayed no longer, for his men needed time to get into position. Where he would launch his attack – on the east wall or to the south –
was a secret he had held close, for the very simple reason that if no one knew it could not be betrayed either by a loose tongue or a needy purse. Also his delay in deploying was designed to make Raymond think he might stand aside to await the outcome of the Provençal effort, only moving when he was sure of its success.
‘If our task is to get onto the southern curtain wall, there is to be no attempt to get into the city from there.’ That got many a raised eyebrow and quite a few low-voiced comments. ‘Once we have cleared the parapet, seek out a tower and take it. Once in our possession it is to be held regardless of who seeks to dislodge us.’
If the first remark had set minds working, those closing words had an even greater effect: that the Muslims of Ma’arrat would seek to dislodge them could be taken as a fact; ‘regardless of who’ could only mean Raymond’s men, which was quickly acknowledged by their commander, but with a sharp caveat.
‘Kill as many infidels as you like, but spill a drop of Christian blood and you will answer to me. The task is to take and hold the towers so that even if the Count of Toulouse takes the city he does not hold it without our cooperation.’
Tancred spoke up and it was clear by his tone of voice he was far from happy. ‘This is a repeat of Antioch.’
‘No, nephew, it is a reverse of Antioch.’ Aware of a shifting of feet among his other captains Bohemund was quick to add, ‘There are those of you who are bent on Jerusalem, and that is so of many of the men you lead. I say here and swear that nothing I will do will ever keep you from that goal.’
There was temptation to reprise all the things he had said to Tancred: Antioch must be held if the Crusade was to have any prospect of success and it had to be in the hands of a man who could
repulse any attempt by the Turks to retake it, while no faith could be placed in Alexius Comnenus and Byzantium to do that for them.
That he, Bohemund, was set upon holding the city even against the Emperor, and if any man saw that as covetousness, it was not something for which he was prepared to seek approval, for if he could gain remission for past sins in the Holy City he would gain little else. Instead, the thought of Alexius – the reasons he had lost to him in Thessaly and Macedonia all those years past – gave him a better way to appeal to these men.
‘Antioch is the most vital trading city in Syria, if not the richest between Constantinople and Cairo, so no words of mine are needed to tell any one of you what opportunities exist for a man bent on gaining prosperity in my service. Those of faith who serve with me but wish to fulfil their vow must do so and go on to Jerusalem. But know this, once that task is completed, they will be welcomed back to my banner should they choose to return. Any man who wishes to stay with me in Antioch I will ask to aid me in holding the city and the province in my name.’
The more pious could not look at Bohemund, for he had stated his position with clarity for the first time, not that it had been obscure to anyone with an ounce of sense. Others did hold his eye and it was clear why: Antioch and Northern Syria, which their liege lord now controlled, would require to be administered by the senior men he led.
Castles would have to be built and garrisoned, which meant that the lands around them would be handed out to those who took command of the region, kept it at peace and held their fiefs against invaders. From that came the things of which any landless knight dreamt: titles and wealth.
If it was less than benevolent, Bohemund was challenging their faith, pitting it against their sense of personal yearning. The men who went on to Jerusalem might indeed fulfil their vow – they might also die in the attempt – but if they succeeded in taking the Holy City and survived, by the time they came back to Antioch all the best land would have been parcelled out to those who had stayed. Loyalty to Bohemund would stand higher in their leader’s estimation than the depth of their dedication to Christ.
‘This day, we have a battle to fight that will decide more than what happens here at Ma’arrat an-Numan. Just as I respect the faith of the true Crusader, I will also not press any of you to participate who think that my actions are blameworthy. But that is a decision you must make right now!’
The last expression being made with a bark had all pulling themselves upright; to decline now would be seen as a lack of courage and that they would never show.
The strip of daylight between the tower and the walls of Ma’arrat had so narrowed as to almost disappear yet that last tiny gap was proving the hardest to overcome. For all their efforts the stone crossing they had built over that dry moat had none of the consistency of the impacted ground they had earlier traversed.
The tower first swayed forward, only to lean back again as it was pushed onto another uneven patch, causing the screen which had protected the knights to first drop slightly then be hauled back up again; without it and not engaged in actual combat they were vulnerable in a situation where long pikes could outdistance their lances, while arrows and javelins launched at such a short range might even penetrate their chain mail.
Bohemund had been determined not to begin his own assault until the Provençals were fully engaged, thus pinning the defenders, but matters were not progressing as he had anticipated; it was all taking too long. Too much time had been wasted before the thing first moved and he could feel the stirrings of frustration not only at its slow progress but the way it was compressing the amount of daylight in which he would have to fight.
Behind him stood his warriors and they would be feeling the same impatience, mail-clad knights ranged in an extended line alongside the climbing frames, those lying on the ground where they had been placed overnight. Constructed in numbers they would allow his men to assault an entire section of the southern wall between two towers, an effort harder to defend against than a series of single-person ladders. They also served to send a message that this was no probing attack but one designed to take the city.
There was also in his calculation the notion that even if the danger of his attack were seen as soon as those frames became visible, there would be a time delay between the realisation of the threat and the moves needed to counter it by a defence already heavily engaged in two places. That it was not working as he had hoped required that he change: for the whole assault to succeed and in the available time he would need to draw off some of those opposing Raymond.
‘Blow the horns,’ he commanded, moving forward himself under his red banner so that all along the line his men could see it was time to move.
Up from the covering brushwood came the frames; as soon as they were in view they caused a ripple of obvious alarm on the battlements, as the nature of what they portended was assessed. It should have been a time to break into a run, to get to the base of the walls at
speed, regardless of the ditch, but those frames, as they had to be, were made of heavy timber and green stuff with it, full of sap and ten times the weight of seasoned wood.
Thus the Apulians shuffled forward, dragging the frames behind them, seeking with their free hand to place their shields in the best place to ward off danger. If they bellowed their bloody intentions, their count in his dignity could do no more than threaten those men on the walls with the fierce nature of his appearance – his massive height added to the mighty axe he carried, the white surcoat he wore, still with its red Crusader cross – for the threat of Christian retribution to a Muslim was more forbidding than any de Hauteville family device.
As he came closer the men on the walls might see the look in his eyes, steady blue orbs on either side of the drooping nose guard of a conical Norman helmet. If they did it should chill their blood, for the promise of the gaze was one of death and mutilation. Naturally because of his stature and the position of leadership he adopted Bohemund became the prime target that had to be stopped, so that every projectile cast or fired from the walls came in his direction.
To protect him, and this was their duty, his familia knights stepped up to surround their lord and used their shields to create an impenetrable barrier off which arrows and javelins bounced, that raised to cover heads the closer they came to the massive rectangular stones, jointed with mortar, that made up the walls. All along the line his men were dropping into the dry moat, before setting down their burdens, a foot set on the base to secure them, while those who came behind rushed to raise them hand over hand until the tops rested on the battlements.
The enemy sought to immediately push the frames away, only to
find the very weight that had slowed the Apulians made it impossible for the defenders to budge them and that was rendered even more difficult as soon at the attackers began their slow climb. What came down on them to slow their progress was dangerous – boiling oil, rocks, javelins and heavier spears – but it was widespread and not sufficient in content or concentrated enough to impose a complete check.
That came from the tenacity of the defenders, who, when engaged fought with a fury that surpassed anything the Crusaders had encountered previously and their efforts increased when reinforcements arrived from the western wall to stop this fresh assault. Bohemund, as was required by any warrior chieftain, was well to the fore, his axe swings deadly to anyone caught in their arc, for each blow was not of a weight to merely wound, aware that even with this form of assault only so many of his fighters could engage at any one time.