An Experiment in Extremity: The Portrayal of Violence in Robert the Monk's Narrative of the First Crusade

Abstract

AbstractThis article examines the portrayal of physical violence enacted by Latin Christians during the First Crusade in Robert the Monk's Historia Iherosolomitana, with particular reference to the fighting witnessed outside Antioch in early 1098. The narrative techniques and effects used by Robert are established by employing the tools of narratological analysis. Comparisons are drawn with other Latin accounts of the First Crusade, alongside Latin sources detailing the Norman conquests of England and Sicily, and, in methodological terms, a case is made against strictly intra‐textual narratology.It is argued that Robert made a conscious decision to amplify crusader violence, detailing Latin brutality in unusually graphic and extreme terms, not least through the extensive use of blood imagery and the suggestion that crusader savagery could inspire sensations of horror. By exploring the portrayal of violence beyond the context of the apocalypticism associated with Jerusalem, a broader range of influences and impulses shaping Robert's authorial interventions are posited – notably his echoing of chansons de geste tropes and his desire to assert Frankish martial indomitability. Robert the Monk's distinctive approach to the portrayal of violence also provides us with a means to reassess the dissemination and impact of his Historia, which to date has been presented as medieval Europe's ‘bestselling’ account of the First Crusade. Potential links to a range of medieval Latin narratives are newly identified in this article, but it is suggested that Robert the Monk's representation of violence did not demonstrably influence later crusade narratives.