CRUSADE 1096-1162

Meanwhile, five armies are heading towards Constantinople: that of the French king, a Flemish army, a Norman army from Italy, a Norman-French army and finally an army of French feudal lords from the south, all travelling by different routes, plundering on the march; the Crusaders organize bloody persecutions of Jews in Worms, Cologne, Mainz, Trier and many other cities of the Holy Empire, the Bishop of Cologne and the Polish King Vladislav I oppose the persecutions, thousands of Jews take refuge in Poland, but the Princes Zbigniew and Boleslav, Vladislav's brothers, do not accept the immigrants and a civil war breaks out. Finally the Crusaders are concentrated in Constantinople, Emperor Alexius demands an oath of vassalage and that the conquests of the Crusade belong to Byzantium.