21. The Weasel’s Son Became a Middle Eastern Prince
Medieval adventurer Bohemond I (circa 1055 – 1109) was the eldest son of Duke Robert Guiscard, the Weasel. The apple did not fall far from the tree, and Bohemond took after his father as a gifted warrior and capable diplomat. He also took after the Weasel as a treacherous, ambitious, and duplicitous man of action. Bohemond’s disinheritance in favor of the offspring of his father’s new wife forced him to seek his own fortunes. He found them in the First Crusade.
In the late eleventh century, the Byzantine Empire faced a serious threat from the Seljuk Turks. The Muslim nomads had defeated the Byzantines decisively at the Battle of Manzikert in 1071, and wrested their heartland of Anatolia. So the Byzantines, despite the Great Schism between their Greek Orthodox Church and the Roman Catholic one, appealed to the pope. In 1095, Pope Urban II organized a gathering of thousands of notables at Clermont in France, where he issued a call to arms to defend the Byzantines and seize Jerusalem from the Muslims.