The First Crusade Sample

Z and I just launched the first episode of a new member series on the First Crusade. And to kick it off, she's giving us a narrative account of the events. So that way we're all on the same page of how bonkers this thing was. Now, this is the first time she's ever done something like this, and as such, I wasn't prepared for how funny her style of narration would be, nor how foul-mouthed she'd be. You're getting the full Dr. Z experience with this one. Here's a sample.

And they have a grand old time for about a day and a half before they hear that there's an army on the way to siege them. So you've got a nice city there if you can keep it. Yeah. General Kerboga of the local area comes in and is like, fuck you. Now you're inside and you're stuck. And the Crusaders, who are in terrible shape, absolutely panic. And the panic just slowly sets in for a good five to six days before it reaches a fever pitch.

And everybody in the city goes fucking nuts. And there are people just trying to, there's a story of a guy who was literally trying to scale the walls out of the city. quietly on a rope, just trying to leave the whole situation. That's amazing. But as he's scaling the building and trying to get down out of there, his brother shows up, who died at the Battle of Nicaea.

And this brother, who is a ghost, just sitting there, imagine this, you're on the side of the wall, trying to get out of there, and your brother, who already died, is like, get your ass back up that wall, and you go fight for Jesus, which is basically what happens. Oh, man. I mean, okay. So clearly they're starving. I feel like that's very much a starving man. Like they went full Lord of the Flies inside. Nope, nope. Scientific explanation that does not exist.

In this world, their brothers are telling them to get back in there. And he's not the only one who has a vision. There's another vision that happens from a guy called Peter of Bartholomew. Does he also talk to a ghost? He talks to the ghost. Okay. So we're now at like Return of the King, whereas the city was made by the dead and the dead keep it. No, no. It's God's telling them to get back in the game. It is halftime and they're about to win.

Seriously. Okay. So he has this vision of St. Andrew. Andrew comes to him and is like, buddy, it's going to be all right. Here's how I'm going to tell you it's going to be all right. You need proof to be all right. I get it. We're going to get that for you. I'm telling you, Peter of Bartholomew, that the holy lance is here in the city. This is the lance that pierced the side of Jesus.

And relics are a big part of this. We're going to get into it in a whole other episode. But relics are very important at this point, like so important. And it's here in the city. Well, that's convenient. And this being a, you know, Iron Age militarized. I'm sure they don't have any other spears in the city. If you find a spear in the city, it's going to be the Lance of Longinus, right? Oh, yeah. Yeah, totally. Well, specifically, he said, go dig here at the local church.

There under the altar is where it's going to be, which, okay, yeah. So Peter Bartholomew has this vision. And he says, basically, if you find this piece of the lance, Andrew says to Peter, if you find this lance, you know you'll have God's favor. And you can stally forth and you will win. Okay. And so he goes to the princes and says, tells him his vision. I mean, obviously you don't just hold St. Andrew's words to yourself. No. You let him know.

now bishop adamar is there at this point bishop adamar of lapuis this is the the papal legate of pope urban and he's seeing peter and he's like i don't know man i don't like it's not that i don't believe in st andrew obviously i just don't believe he's talking to you and also also i've seen that lance it's already in constantinople we've we've had the lance it's there there's no

other lance that's not how it goes no he's very skeptical that he writes about his skepticism fortunately for peter there there is someone who's like actually i'm i'm picking up what you're putting down raymond if sanghi

who is a Southern French leader, who becomes pretty prominent at this point because of this event, is like, no, I think this guy's onto something. Let's go digging. And so in the midst of this panic, as things are going terrible, people are trying to... scale the walls so hard that their ghost brothers are telling them to get back in the fight they go digging in the church to find the lance and they dig i think for like two days and they find nothing they don't find shit

which is very demoralizing. But Peter's like, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. It's okay. I see something. I see something. He jumps in the hole, this giant hole. They said it's like, it sounds like it's like eight feet down or something by this point. He pops up with a piece of metal. It's like, I found it.

Did anyone look up his sleeve? I feel like someone should have looked up his sleeve. No one cares because they need something. And so that's enough. Everyone's like, all right, okay. God's got our back. It's going to be all right.

And so they take the lance and they parade it around the city and they get all the crusaders back up and on their feet and like give a morale Bruce. And they start doing these sermons and these, uh, the priest start giving talks and get everyone pumped. And on the... 28th of june so like two weeks later they actually sally forth out of antioch and the description of this battle is that they were joined by another army of angels

And dead crusaders all in white on horses. Okay, so it is absolutely the big battle outside of the White City in Lord of the Rings. Yeah. Where Aragorn's dead friends show up and start messing up the Oliphants. Honestly, it sounds more like at least the vision of the end of the battle of...

Helm's Deep, where Gandalf comes in with the light. I mean, that part is awesome. But those, the Rohirrim were quite alive. We're talking way too much Lord of the Rings. Let's go back to Crusades. Point is, the Crusaders say on that day as they sallied forth. out of Antioch, starving, desperate.

That an army of angels, saints, and dead crusaders dressed in white and on white horses come forward. And in fact, they do force the army into a route and they win the day. They win Antioch. Uh-oh. Uh-oh, indeed. All right. If you'd like to hear more and there's so much more, we go on for over an hour and it's a blast. And if you'd like to support the podcast in general, because as you know, there are no ads in the show and it's only through the support of members that we're able to keep doing.

So if you'd like to support the show and listen to more of Z's crazy narration because it's awesome, please consider signing up for membership. You can do so at thebritishhistorypodcast.com. Thanks for listening.