(June 28, 2015 at 7:25 pm)Minimalist Wrote:Quote: For Western Christendom, it was for many centuries under the control of the Byzantine Greeks who had not yet broken with Rome.
Do you ever know what you are talking about?
The muslims took Jerusalem in 634. Urban II didn't get around to calling for the Crusade until 1095. News did not travel THAT slowly!
Wars were waged slowly then, and it was the duty of the Byzantine Emperor to defend the East from heathen invaders not the Roman Pontiff. He only stepped outside of his temporal sphere of power in the west after being asked by the Byzantine Emperor.