Victory in the East by John France

Author:John France [France, John]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Published: 1994-07-14T00:00:00+00:00

Fig. 8 Siege of Antioch, October 1097 – February 1098

The reason for this debate was quite simply the scale of the problem which they now faced. Antioch was no longer the magnificent city of late Roman times, when its population had reached 300,000 and it rejoiced in its position as capital of the East. Its prosperity was ruined by a series of disasters – the fire of 525, the earthquakes of 526, 528 and 588, the Persian sack of 540, the plague of 542 and the Arab capture of 638. However, though the inhabited city was much reduced, it still sheltered within the walls of Justinian’s rebuilding completed by 560 and as modified by earthquake, war and the ravages of time.88 The crusaders were much struck by the splendour and strength of the place, as was Ibn Butlân in 1051 when he described its walls as having 360 towers: archaeological investigation has found evidence of over sixty (we are not sure of the original total).89 Antioch was built on the eastern bank of the Orontes river, though its walls touched the stream only at the Bridge Gate (see figs. 7 and 8). The fortified area was about three kilometres long and two kilometres deep extending up the eastern wall of the Orontes valley formed by the northern extension of the Jebel al-Ansariye. The mass of Mount Silpius included in the enceinte rises to a height of 512 metres and about 700 metres north of its highest point stood the citadel, rebuilt after the Byzantine reconquest of 969 and dominating the whole enclosure. The wall then dropped into the deep gully of the Parmenian torrent where the Iron Gate restrained this dangerous stream before climbing onto the southern flank of Mount Staurin and then descending sharply to the plain by the Orontes at the northern edge of the city.90 The crusaders approached the city from the north, and here in the valley bottom the wall was pierced by three gates which the crusaders called the St Paul Gate at the very foot of the mountain, the Dog Gate further along and then the Gate of the Duke nearer the river. This northern wall of the city was a double wall, for Albert of Aix mentions an outer wall in connection with operations outside the Dog Gate and tells us that Tancred lurked in the space between the main wall and the barbican before launching a surprise attack on the besiegers during the second siege.91 Beyond the Dog Gate the wall angled towards the river bank, though it is not clear that the outer wall continued at this point, which it met at the Bridge Gate giving access to the plain on the west bank of the Orontes and the roads to St Symeon Port, Alexandretta and Marasch. After that the wall followed the river fairly closely then turned away from it to the St George Gate, from which a road ran to the ancient suburb of Daphne and beyond down to Laodicea and inland to Syria via the Jisr ash-Shogur.

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