Criminal Law and the Development of the Assizes of the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem in the Twelfth Century
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CRIMINAL LAW AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE ASSIZES OF THE CRUSADER KINGDOM OF JERUSALEM IN THE TWELFTH CENTURY by Adam M. Bishop A thesis submitted in conformity with the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Centre for Medieval Studies University of Toronto © Copyright by Adam M. Bishop 2011 Criminal Law and the Development of the Assizes of the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem in the Twelfth Century Adam M. Bishop Doctor of Philosophy Centre for Medieval Studies University of Toronto 2011 Abstract The legal treatises of the Kingdom of Jerusalem were written in the thirteenth century, when most of the kingdom had been re-conquered by the Muslims. There are no treatises from the twelfth century, when the kingdom was at its height. The thirteenth-century jurists claimed that the kingdom had always had written laws, but they may have been making this up for political purposes. The treatises also discuss issues important to the noble class of which the jurists were a part: property rights and the feudal services owed to the king, as well as the proper way to plead their cases in court. But what do they say about criminal law, and laws for the lower classes? How were crimes tried and punished in the twelfth century, and did this differ from the laws recorded in the thirteenth century? Chapter one deals with the different treatises, and their claim that there was a set of laws called “Letres dou Sepulcre” in the twelfth century. The most important of the treatises for criminal law, the assizes of the burgess court, is examined in detail. Chapter two looks at the small number of laws that survive from the twelfth century, in charters, the canons of the Council of Nablus, and the chronicle of William of Tyre. Chapter three is a study of other descriptions of crusader law in the twelfth century, including those by Christian and Muslim pilgrims, and ii especially the observations of Usama ibn Munqidh. These accounts are tied together by the common theme of theft and the ways that thieves could be punished. Chapter four deals with cases mentioned by thirteenth-century sources, including theft, assault, and prostitution, but especially cases that led to trials by battle. The usefulness of such trials for dating some of the laws is also examined. The conclusion demonstrates that certain parts of the assizes relating to criminal law must have already existed in the twelfth century, and offers some tentative ideas about the specific origin of the laws. Avenues for future research are also introduced. iii Acknowledgments In Mr. Peter Young’s grade 11 World Civilizations class, I wrote a 1000-word essay about the crusades, and I was amazed not only that medieval Europeans knew about Jerusalem, but also that history happened at all that long ago. At the time I thought I should have been studying science or math or computers, but I was terrible at all of those things, and thanks to Mr. Young, history became something more than just a hobby. At the University of Western Ontario, I took Maya Shatzmiller’s seminar on the crusades, which was my first detailed introduction to the history and sources. I was sure I would never figure out which Baldwin was which, but Prof. Shatzmiller will be happy to know that I’ve got them all straightened out now. Her advice and support have been very helpful throughout the rest of my academic career. From the University of Toronto I am grateful to the members of my PhD committee: Lawrin Armstrong, from whom I learned about law and diplomatics, and who made sure I always kept my citations coherent; Mark Meyerson, for whose class on medieval violence I wrote an essay that was the origin of this thesis; Linda Northrup, who encouraged me to study Arabic and the Muslim sources; and Michael Gervers, who kept everything on track and always had a perfect reference or contact for all of my questions. Along with Prof. Armstrong I should also thank George Rigg and David Townsend, with whom I spent four years as a teaching assistant for the Latin program at the Centre for Medieval Studies. I would also like to thank my friends and fellow students at the Centre. I did not get to see them very much, but we often discussed theses and historiographical problems over e-mail and Facebook status updates. Thanks also to Dominik Szymanski, for threatening violence whenever I wanted to give up. I would also like to thank Niall Christie of the University of British Columbia, for his advice on studying Arabic, and on presenting conference papers; Alison Campbell from the Resource Sharing Department at the University of Toronto’s Mississauga campus, who found many obscure works for me in libraries around the world; and the Toronto Sun newspaper, where I worked the night shift in the library. Much of my time there was spent writing my thesis and I am thankful to my co-workers for their encouragement. (I am also thankful for the many thousands of free photocopies I was able to make there.) iv When I was younger the trips I was most excited about were only as far away as the local library. Even though my parents thought I should be reading children’s books like other kids, they never stopped me from taking out the big non-fiction books. My parents and my sister have given me so much support of every kind that I do not know where to begin thanking them. Lastly, my wife Carolyn. She steps over my random piles of books and listens to me ramble on about things that must be extremely boring to a normal person, but she also sacrificed her own education to take care of our son Aiden, so I could finish mine. I can never really repay her for that. v Table of Contents Abstract ii Acknowledgments iv Table of Contents vi Introduction 1 Chapter 1 The Assizes of Jerusalem 17 Assizes of the Haute Cour 17 Philip of Novara 18 John of Ibelin 21 The Livre au Roi 23 The “Letres dou Sepulcre” 25 The Letres in history, 1690‐1839 28 Beugnot and Paris 30 French and German reactions to Beugnot 35 Maurice Grandclaude and the twentieth century 41 English and French scholarship after Grandclaude 42 Conclusions 51 Assizes of the Cour des Bourgeois 55 Dating the assizes 57 Origins of the burgesses 59 Establishment of the court 63 Composition and jurisdiction of the court 65 Other courts under burgess jurisdiction 68 The burgess assizes and Roman law 69 Conclusion 73 Chapter 2 Surviving and reconstructed laws from the twelfth century 77 The Council of Nablus 77 The Council in history 79 Mayer and the Council as concordat 81 Kedar and the origins of the canons 82 Were the canons the law of the kingdom? 84 vi Charters 86 Hospitaller charter for Bethgibelin 87 Royal charter for Pisan merchants 90 Relevance of the charters 90 Twelfth‐century law in the thirteenth‐century assizes 91 Property laws 92 Murder and assault 94 Dating the early laws 96 William of Tyre 97 The revolt of Hugh II of Jaffa 100 Attack against Hugh II 105 Other laws in William of Tyre 109 Assessment of William 113 Conclusions 116 Chapter 3 Cases of theft in the twelfth century 120 Christian sources 122 Ibn Jubayr 124 Theft in the Nablus area 126 Diya ad‐Din al‐Maqdisi 129 Usama ibn Munqidh 130 Usama and judicial combat 134 Usama and the ordeal of water 144 Usama and shipwrecks 148 Usama and the Haute Cour 151 Assessment of Usama 152 Conclusions 153 Chapter 4 Thirteenth‐century cases 158 The Third Crusade 158 James of Vitry 162 Burchard of Mount Sion 163 Philip of Novara and the war against Frederick II 164 Judicial combats 167 Duels as evidence for dating the assizes 170 vii Other examples of treason 175 John of Joinville 177 John and the military orders 178 Assault on John’s knight 180 Prostitution 180 Decline and fall of the second kingdom 183 Conclusions 186 Chapter 5 Conclusion 189 Bibliography 200 Primary sources 200 Secondary sources 206 Appendix 1 Online resources 217 Appendix 2 Glossary of Arabic terms 222 viii 1 Introduction Jerusalem was captured on July 15, 1099, at the end the First Crusade, which had begun four years earlier in 1095. Along the way the crusaders had also conquered Edessa in Mesopotamia, and Antioch in northern Syria. This success was never repeated by subsequent crusades from Europe, but those who remained in Jerusalem after 1099 managed to carve out a Latin Christian kingdom along the Mediterranean coast.1 “Jerusalem” is thus used here to refer to both the kingdom, and the city itself. The crusaders adhered to the Latin Roman Catholic rite, and so they and their kingdom are often called “Latin.” Because they usually came from the territory of the early medieval Franks, they often referred to themselves as “Franks” and “Frankish”, terms also used by the Muslims and Greeks whom the crusaders encountered in the east. One of the leaders of the First Crusade, Godfrey of Bouillon, was elected as the first ruler of the kingdom. He died the next year in 1100, but despite his short reign, he was seen by later generations as a legendary hero who, among other things, established the first laws. At the time, however, no one was really sure if Jerusalem would be a secular kingdom, or if it would be ruled as a papal fief; the papal legate Daimbert of Pisa preferred the latter, and Godfrey may have promised to hand the city of Jerusalem over to him.