Page 76 - All About History - Issue 186-19

The crusaders had
very few warhorses at
the time of the battle

mighty Seljuk Turkish army rode out of Mosul
in Upper Mesopotamia in late spring 1098
on a mission to rescue a Turkish garrison
besieged in the citadel of Antioch by an army
of Latin crusaders from Western Europe. At
its head rode Kerbogha, the grizzled, grey-bearded
Seljuk governor of the great Mesopotamian city.
Behind him rode thousands of white-robed bowmen
and heavily armoured ghulam lancers. Black banners
swayed over the long columns of horsemen as they
rode west.
Yaghi-Siyan, the commander of the beleaguered
Seljuk garrison that had retreated into Antioch’s
I citadel, breathed a sigh of relief when word reached

him that Kerbogha had declared a jihad against the
Latin crusaders who’d fought their way into the city
on 2 June. It had taken the crusaders seven months
to capture Antioch. During that time, their numbers
had dwindled considerably owing to skirmishing,
SYRIA, 28 JUNE 1098 disease and desertion.
Although approximately 100,000 men had
responded to Pope Urban’s call for a crusade in 1095
Written by William E. Welsh to liberate Jerusalem from the ‘infidels’, only half that

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