1175-1189 Abergavenny Massacre

Chronicum Anglicanum by Ralph Coggeshall. In this year [4th July 1187] Saladin attacked the army of the Christians, which, worn out by a laborious march and weighed down by the excessive heat, with water entirely lacking, he defeated in a place called Marescaucie, which is three miles distant from the city of Tiberias. Then six of King Guy's knights fled to Saladin and informed him of everything and of the plans of the Christians. Whereupon Saladin, who had previously doubted the outcome of the battle, regained confidence, and with an innumerable multitude of warriors he attacked the Christians with every form of combat and defeated them. At last Taqi al-Din, nephew of Saladin, captured King Guy of Jerusalem as he attempted to flee, together with the Cross of the Lord's wood, after Rufinus, bishop of Acre, who against custom had carried it while clad in armour, was killed. And this by the just judgment of God, because he had placed his confidence more in earthly arms than in heavenly. Prince Reynald [of Châtillon] was killed there; Roger de Mowbray and Hugh de Beauchamp were captured, with many nobles besides; and almost the whole Christian army was shattered, captured, and slaughtered by the Saracens. But the count of Tripoli with a few others escaped unharmed by flight.

Hoc anno Saláádini exercitus Christianorum exercitum, laborioso itinere confectum et nimio caloris æstu prægravatum, aqua omnino deficiente, expugnavit in loco qui dicitur Marescaucie, qui locus distat a civitate Tyberiadis tribus millibus. Tunc sex ex militibus regis Guidonis ad Saláádinum confugerunt, et de omni re et proposito Christianorum eum instruxerunt. Unde Saláádinus, qui antea de discrimine belli dubitabat, resumpsit vires, et cum infinita multitudine bellatorum Christianos omni genere pugnandi invasit et expugnavit. Tandem Tekedinus, nepos Saláádini, Guidonem regem Hierusalem fugam arripientem cepit cum Cruce Dominici ligni, interfecto Rufino episcopo de Achon, qui eam, contra consuetudinem, loricatus portavit, et hoc digno Dei judicio, quia magis in armis terrenis quam in cœlestibus confidentiam habuit. Princeps Reginaldus ibidem interfectus est; Rogerus de Mumbrai, Hugo de Bellocampo capti sunt, et plures nobilium cum eis; et fere universus exercitus Christianorum a Sarracenis confractus, captus et trucidatus est; sed comes Tripolitanus cum quibusdam aliis per fugam illæsus evasit.

Chronicum Anglicanum by Ralph Coggeshall. After this, on the twentieth day of the month of September [1187], the holy city of Jerusalem was besieged by the unbelievers with great blaring of trumpets, the clash of arms, and the howling of those shouting. The people of Jerusalem for one week fought manfully against them. But at length the Christians, worn down and exhausted by the cruel and unrelenting struggle of the Turks, were so reduced that scarcely twenty or thirty appeared for the defense of the city's walls. Already there was no man so bold in the whole city who, even for the price of a hundred bezants, would dare to keep watch for one night in its defense. Meanwhile, the inhabitants of Jerusalem, compelled by necessity, three times sent envoys to the king of Syria, begging that he accept a hundred bezants for their ransom and allow them to depart freely with their goods from the holy city. But when he refused this, at last, after taking counsel, he imposed this tribute upon the Jerusalemites: that each male of ten years and above should pay ten bezants for his release, each woman five, and each child of seven years and under, one; and so, being freed from slavery, they might safely depart wherever they wished. This agreement pleased the lord patriarch and the others who had money; but those who had no gold wept continually with lamentable cries. Thus, in the year 1187, Jerusalem was handed over (alas!) into the hands of the wicked by the Christians, who had possessed it for eighty-seven years since it was first wrested from the power of the pagans.

Post hæc, vicesima die mensis Septembris sancta civitas Hierusalem obsessa est ab incredulis cum magno clangore tubarum, et strepitu armorum, et ululatu vociferantium. Hierosolymitæ vero per unam hebdomadam viriliter contra eos certabant. Sed tandem Christiani crudeli et indefesso Turcorum certamine sic defatigati et defecti erant, ut vix viginti vel triginta ad defensiones murorum civitatis apparerent. Non inveniebatur jam homo tam audax in omni civitate qui pro pretio centum Bisantiorum auderet una nocte ad defensionem vigilare. Inter hæc habitatores Hierusalem, necessitate compulsi, legatos ad regem Syriæ per ter mittunt, supplicantes quatenus centum Bisantiorum pro sua redemptione ab eis accipiat, et eos libere de sancta civitate cum suis egredi permittat. At illo renuente, tandem, accepto consilio, tale tributum Hierosolymitis instituit, quatenus unusquisque masculus decem annorum et supra, pro sui liberatione decem Bisantios persolveret, femina quinque, puer septem annorum et infra, unum; et sic a servitute liberati, quo vellent securi abirent. Placuit ergo conventio ista domino patriarchæ et cæteris qui pecunias habebant; qui vero aureos non habebant, lamentabili voce indesinenter plangebant. Igitur anno MCLXXXVII. tradita est Hierusalem (proh dolor!) in manibus nefandorum a Christianis, qui eam possederant per quater viginti et septem annos ex quo erepta fuerat a potestate paganorum.