Third Crusade

Meanwhile, the Crusade estates are on a knife edge following the fall of Jerusalem in 1187.

The Third Crusade has stabilised what's left of the Christian possessions in the Holy Land, but hasn't taken back the Holy City.

A severely weakened regime in Constantinople has been on the receiving end of threats and bullying from the crusading movement for decades by this stage, and in the mid-1190s the Byzantines hand over a monumental payout to Barbarossa's son, Henry VI, to fund his proposed crusade in the mid-1190s.

That crusade never happened, thanks to Henry's untimely death, but the Byzantines never got their money back.

The news of the fall of the Holy City aroused Europe from its apathy regarding the Crusades.

Frederick Barbarossa of Germany, Philip Augustus of France, and Richard the Lionhearted of England took the cross and led great armies to the east in the Third Crusade, 1189-1192.

Frederick died before reaching Palestine and his troops separated, some continuing their march as far as Acre and others returning home.

Richard and Philip, after a long siege, succeeded in recapturing Acre, but quarreled so bitterly that Philip returned home.

It was ruined by the departure of the herring, which left the Baltic, and by the great geographical discoveries of the fifteenth century, which gave the commercial advantage to other nations.

The sphere of German influence was greatly extended in the northeast by the efforts of the Teutonic Order.

This had been founded at the siege of Acre during the Third Crusade, and had been confirmed in 1191 by the Pope.

For a time its knights served in the Holy Land, but in 1231 transferred their activity to the lands along the Baltic, which were still held by the heathen Slavs.

In a little bit, Dr. Matt Phillips will join us.

We'll talk about King Richard the Lionheart of England, the leader of the Third Crusade, who was born on this day in 1157.

Here's an email from a listener in Germany.

Steven writes, Dear Pastor Wilkin, as a European, I love listening to the goofy ideas that Americans come up with.

And then we'll remember Richard the Lionheart.

of England, leader of the Third Crusade, who was born on this day in 1157.

Dr. Matt Phillips, professor of history at Concordia University, Nebraska, will be our guest.

Glenn Stanton is director of family formation studies for Focus on the Family, author of a recent column for Public Discourse titled Gay Pride 2026, Leaders Confessed Losing Control of Their Movement.

gotten worse since the end of, of numeral tray.

You would basically say at this point, all of the greats from the third crusade have died.

And the third crusade is typically the one that history talks about a lot.

There's myths associated with Richard, the lion heart.

And, you know, there's, there's countless, uh, books about Saladin, uh, Those guys have died.

Trade is becoming more and more important.

Okay.

And so that's why cities like if you're doing a snapshot of where we're at at the end of the third crusade, the kingdom of Jerusalem, which is kind of funny because it doesn't have Jerusalem.

We know this because Roger of Howden, a royal clerk who traveled with the king and had access to the king's own retinue, recorded what happened with it.

In early 1191, just as the monks at Glastonbury were either excavating their grave or getting ready to, King Richard I was wintering in Sicily on his way to the Third Crusade.

He was in a tricky spot and his sister Joan, widow of the recently deceased Sicilian king, had been effectively imprisoned by the new ruler, Tancred of Lecce.

Richard had already muscled his way into Messina, rattled the cages of the locals, extracted his sister, and squeezed a hefty ransom out of Tancred.