The first crusade was an attempt made to re-capture Jerusalem, which was followed by seven major other crusades in desire to get rid of all the Muslims, not only in Jerusalem but from the whole region. Muslims had ruled Jerusalem since 638, even though that this disturbed the Christians a little, and Christians were allowed to visit the holy land for pilgrimage. But things changed a lot in the 11th century when the Seljuk Turks took over. Muslim soldiers made life very dangerous and hard to get to Jerusalem which put many of the Christians in great anger and wanting to fight to get back there holy land. Pope Urban II is actually responsible for assigning Emperor Alexius I in launching the first crusade. Many people volunteered to fight and regain there holy land. Believing that regaining there holy land was in gods will, and the sins which people have committed will be forgiven, the first crusade set off and was a huge success in 1099, even though they killed any living body they saw in Jerusalem and riding in knee deep rivers of blood.
In this essay, I will be explaining to you, the main few reasons why the first crusade took place in 1096, and also a little bit about what happened after that.
One reason of the first crusade is to protect the Byzantium Empire. Firstly, the Byzantium Empire was first created by the roman emperor, Constantine. The entire roman empire moved and a new empire was created. In 330 he officially declared and named it “Nea Roma” or “Nova Roma” which meant the new Rome. After his death in 337, it was renamed Constantinople. (City of Constantine)