Battle of Hattin

Background

By the 1180s Saladin had united Egypt and Muslim Syria under his rule and surrounded the Latin states founded by the First Crusade. The Kingdom of Jerusalem was divided between the faction of King Guy of Lusignan and that of Raymond III, Count of Tripoli, and its truce with Saladin was broken when Reynald of Châtillon attacked Muslim caravans. In late June 1187 Saladin crossed the Jordan with perhaps 30,000 men, and on 2 July he took the town of Tiberias, where Raymond's wife was holding the citadel. The crusaders had gathered the largest army the kingdom could raise — some 1,200 knights and perhaps 15,000 to 20,000 men in all — at the springs of Sephoria, about fifteen miles to the west. Raymond advised waiting there, with water, and letting Saladin's army wear itself out in the heat. Gerard de Ridefort, master of the Knights Templar, and Reynald urged the king to march to the relief of Tiberias, and Guy gave the order.

The Battle

On 3 July the army set out across a waterless plateau in the full heat of summer. Saladin's horse archers harassed the column all day, attacking the rearguard of Templars and Hospitallers until the march slowed to a halt near the village of Lubiya, still short of the water at Lake Tiberias. The army camped without water, surrounded, and in the night the Muslims set fire to the dry grass so that the smoke blew over the camp. On the morning of 4 July the crusaders tried to push through toward the springs at Hattin. The infantry broke formation and fled up onto the Horns, a double hill of an extinct volcano, leaving the knights without the protection of their foot soldiers. Raymond of Tripoli led a charge; the Muslim line opened to let his men through and closed again behind them, and he escaped the battle. The knights around the king's red tent on the Horns made charges that nearly reached Saladin himself, but one by one they were driven back until the tent fell and the survivors surrendered.

Weapons

The crusaders' strength was the heavy cavalry charge with the Knight's Lance, mail armor and the Arming Sword, protected on the march by infantry with spears and crossbows. Saladin's army combined Turkish horse archers with their composite bows, armored cavalry carrying lance, sword and mace, and infantry. His tactics — thirst, fire, and arrows at a distance until the crusader formation fell apart — were designed to deny the knights the one charge that could win the battle.

Aftermath

King Guy was taken prisoner, and the relic of the True Cross carried before the army was captured. Saladin personally killed Reynald of Châtillon, and had the captured Templars and Hospitallers, about two hundred men, executed. With its field army gone, the kingdom could not resist: Acre fell within days, and Jerusalem surrendered on 2 October 1187 after a short siege. The news provoked the Third Crusade, led by Richard I of England, Philip II of France and Frederick Barbarossa, which recovered Acre and the coast but never Jerusalem.