In a previous post, we introduced several chroniclers who gave an account of Urban’s Speech at the Council of Clermont. In this post, we will discuss Pope Urban II’s objectives. What exactly was he asking for at the Council of Clermont? Here, it will be argued that Urban II framed the expedition he called for at the Council of Clermont as a pilgrimage.
What is a Pilgrimage?
A pilgrimage is a devotional practice consisting of a prolonged journey. This would be undertaken on foot or on horseback. The destination of this journey would be a holy site, or shrine of a Saint. The more popular pilgrimage destinations in the medieval period were Santiago De Compostella, Rome and of course Jerusalem.
The purpose of a pilgrimage was to ultimately bring one closer to God by visiting a place that had been in direct contact with a holy person. Be that a Saint, the Virgin Mary, or Christ himself. The objective was to be close to the Divine. If we take the example of Jerusalem, walking and touching the places where Christ visited was a spiritual experience.
A pilgrimage was not a holiday. The more arduous the journey, the more suffering the pilgrim endured, the closer he or she would come to the Divine. The journey to the site was often dangerous, it was intended to be. Pilgrimages were also expensive. Consider the travelling costs, accommodation, taxes and fees paid to the keeper of the shrine.
People undertook pilgrimages for a variety of reasons. Sometimes as punishment. A priest or a confessor might assign an individual pilgrimage as a form of penance if they had committed a terrible sin. It was thought then that only contact with the Divine could forgive this sin and bring the person redemption.
Some undertook pilgrimage because they wanted to pay reverence to a particular Saint. Individuals may have promised pilgrimage to a Saint’s shrine in exchange for that Saint’s assistance in some matter. They might be a particularly pious person and desire to go on pilgrimage as an act of reverence.
What Did Urban Call For at the Council of Clermont?
When trying to learn something about Urban’s objectives at the Council of Clermont, the first problem we encounter is we do not know exactly what Urban called for. We do not have his exact words. 1M. Bull, ‘The pilgrimage origins of the First Crusade’, History Today, Vol. 47, Iss. 3, (Mar 1997), pp. 10-15. The term Crusade wasn’t available to people in the 11th century. No such term existed. The word Crusade doesn’t’ appear until the 16th or 17th century. 2For a more detailed discussion of the etymology of the word Crusade, see B. Weber (eds.) Crusade: The Uses of a Word from the Middle Ages to the Present, (2024). We know he called for something that did indeed later become the First Crusade, but what did he call this proposed expedition and how did he describe it?
In various versions of Urban’s speech, reference is made to either pilgrims, pilgrimage or ‘taking the cross’. For instance, in the Gesta Francorum, Urban is quoted as saying:
When now that time was at hand which the Lord Jesus daily points out to His faithful, especially in the Gospel, saying, “If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me,” a mighty agitation was carried on throughout all the region of Gaul. (Its tenor was) that if anyone desired to follow the Lord zealously, with a pure heart and mind, and wished faithfully to bear the cross after Him, he would no longer hesitate to take up the way to the Holy Sepulchre.
Rosalind M. Hill, ed. and trans., Gesta francorum et aliorum Hierosolymitanorum: The Deeds of the Franks (London: 1962).
Baldric of Dol includes a similar description:
at once they all stitched the badge of the holy cross on their outer clothing. For indeed the Pope had instructed them to do this, and it had been agreed by those going to make this their banner. Of course the pope had preached that the Lord said to his followers: ‘If anyone doth not carry his cross and come after me, he cannot be my disciple. Therefore,’ he said, ‘you ought to fix the cross on your garments so that you may both march more safely by reason of this and you may suggest to those who see it both an example and an incentive.’
S.B. Edgington (trans.) Baldric of Bourgueil: “History of the Jerusalemites”: A Translation of the Historia Ierosolimitana, (2020), p. 50.
As Baldric explains, audience members at the Council of Clermont began to stitch crosses to their garments. Other chroniclers, including Robert the Monk, give a similar account:
Whoever, therefore, shall determine upon this holy pilgrimage and shall make his vow to God to that effect and shall offer himself to Him as a, living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, shall wear the sign of the cross of the Lord on his forehead or on his breast. When,’ truly’,’ having fulfilled his vow be wishes to return, let him place the cross on his back between his shoulders. Such, indeed, by the twofold action will fulfill the precept of the Lord, as He commands in the Gospel, “He that taketh not his cross and followeth after me, is not worthy of me.”
Robert the Monk: “Urban and the Crusaders”, Translations and Reprints from the Original Sources of European History, Vol 1:2, (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania, 1895), pp. 5-8
Guibert of Nogent also makes reference to people ‘taking the Cross’:
He [Urban] ordered that something like a soldier’s belt, or rather that for those about to fight for the Lord, something bearing the sign of the Lord’s passion, the figure of a Cross, be sewn onto the tunics and cloaks of those who were going.
Guibert of Nogent, (trans. R. Levine), The Deeds of God Through the Franks, (2003).
According to several versions of Urban’s speech then, the Pope asked his audience to follow the way of Christ, to follow his example and to take up his cross.
Medieval pilgrims literally ‘took the cross’ as these First Crusaders did. Pilgrims wore a cross on their garments as an outward symbol. It told everyone they were on a special journey, a pilgrimage. According to several chroniclers, Urban asked the First Crusaders to take a vow. This was a central element of the ‘Taking of the Cross’. 3J.A. Brundage, A Note on the Attestations of Crusaders’ Vows’, The Catholic Historical Review, (Jul., 1966), Vol. 52, No. 2, pp. 234 – 239. Pilgrims also took vows. Like pilgrims, Urban asked his audience to leave their homes and families and embark on a journey. As with pilgrims, Crusaders’ property would come under Church Protection during their absence.
Did Urban Call for a Pilgrimage at the Council of Clermont?
J. Riley-Smith argued that there is no doubt Urban preached the expedition as a pilgrimage and, moreover, the goal of Jerusalem made the Crusade a Pilgrimage.4 J. Riley-Smith, The First Crusade and Idea of Crusading, (2003), p. 22. Urban had no precedent for his proposed expedition. It was a hitherto unique undertaking. The closest thing he could compare it to would be a pilgrimage, but a pilgrimage with a difference. This was an armed pilgrimage to Jerusalem. Yet this concept is contradictory. Pilgrimage was a penitential act and pilgrims were not permitted to bear arms. However, the novelty of this enterprise should not be lost on us here, as it certainly was not lost on contemporaries. Urban was proposing something new.
Given the parallels, it seems highly likely that Urban framed the proposed expedition as a pilgrimage. Thereby defining the proposed expedition in a way that was familiar to his audience. Or, perhaps those writing in the immediate years following the First Crusade put those words into Urban’s mouth. It is possible that with hindsight they decided to frame the First Crusade as a pilgrimage and suggest this is how Urban marketed the expedition to his audience.
The former explanation seems the more plausible. Given the frequent reference to pilgrimage in multiple versions of Urban’s speech, it would appear that the Pope used a familiar concept to promote the expedition.
The giving of pilgrim status to crusaders in this way made it possible for the pope to control them to some extent since pilgrims were treated in law as temporary ecclesiastics and thus subject to church courts. The chronicles contain threats of excommunication to those who had failed to fulfil their vow to go on Crusade.
Thus the concept of pilgrimage enabled Urban to explain and market this enterprise at the Council of Clermont and also control the potentially hundreds of thousands who would answer his call.
