The siege of Antioch took place during the First Crusade in 1097 and 1098, on the Crusaders' way to Jerusalem through Syria. Two sieges took place in succession. The Crusaders sieged the city held by the Seljuk Empire from 20 October 1097 to 3 June 1098, when the Crusaders successfully took the city. A Seljuk relieving army then sieged the Crusaders for three weeks in late June. The second siege led to the Battle of Antioch in which the Crusaders defeated the Seljuks led by Kerbogha. The Crusaders then established the Principality of Antioch, ruled by Bohemond of Taranto.
Antioch (modern Antakya) lay in a strategic location on the Crusaders' route to Judea through the Syrian Coastal mountain range. Supplies, reinforcements and retreat could all be controlled by the city. Anticipating that it would be attacked, the Seljuk governor of the city, Yağısıyan, began stockpiling food and sending requests for help. The Byzantine walls surrounding the city presented a formidable obstacle to its capture, but the leaders of the Crusade felt compelled to besiege Antioch anyway.
The Crusaders arrived outside the city on 21 October and began the siege. The garrison sortied unsuccessfully on 29 December. After stripping the surrounding area of food, the Crusaders were forced to look farther afield for supplies, opening themselves to ambush. On 31 December, a force of 20,000 Crusaders encountered a relief army led by Duqaq, ruler of Damascus, heading to Antioch and defeated them. As the siege went on, supplies dwindled, and in early 1098 one in seven of the Crusaders was dying from starvation, and people began deserting.
A second relief force, this time under the command of Duqaq's brother Ridwan, emir of Aleppo, advanced towards Antioch, arriving on 9 February. Like the army of Duqaq before, it was defeated. Antioch was captured on 3 June, although the citadel remained in the hands of the Turkish defenders. Kerbogha, atabeg of Mosul, began a siege against the Crusaders who had occupied Antioch, which lasted from 7 to 28 June 1098. The second siege ended when the Crusaders exited the city to engage Kerbogha's army in battle on 28 June and defeated them. On seeing the Turkish army routed, the defenders remaining in the citadel surrendered.
Background
There are several contemporaneous sources relating to the siege of Antioch and the First Crusade. There are four narrative accounts: those of Fulcher of Chartres, Peter Tudebode, and Raymond of Aguilers, and the anonymous Gesta Francorum. Nine letters survive relating to or from the crusading army; five of them were written while the siege was underway and another in September, not long after the city had been taken.
While there are many sources, the number of people on crusade is unclear because they fluctuated regularly, and many non-combatants on pilgrimage accompanied the soldiers. Historian Jonathan Riley-Smith offers a rough guide, suggesting that perhaps 43,000 people (including soldiers, armed poor, and non-combatants) were involved in the siege of Nicaea in June 1097, while as few as 15,000 may have taken part in the siege of Jerusalem in July 1099.
Lying on the slopes of the Orontes Valley, Antioch covered more than 3.5 square miles (9 km2) and was encircled by walls studded by 400 towers. The river ran along the city's northern wall before entering Antioch from the northwest and exiting east through the northern half of the city. Mount Silpius, crested by a citadel, was Antioch's highest point and rose some 1,000 feet (300 m) above the valley floor. There were six gates through which the city could be entered: three along the northern wall, and one on each of the south, east, and west sides. The valley slopes made approaching from the south, east, or west difficult, so the most practical access route for a large number of people was from the north across flatter ground. The city's defences dated from the reign of the Emperor Justinian I in the 6th century. Though Antioch changed hands twice between then and the arrival of the Crusaders in 1097, each time it was the result of betrayal rather than inadequacy of the defences.
After the Byzantine Empire reconquered Antioch in 969, a programme of fortification building was undertaken in the surrounding area to secure the gains. As part of this, a citadel was built on Mount Silpius in Antioch. High enough to be separate from the city below, historian Hugh Kennedy opines that it "[relied] on inaccessibility as its main defence". At its fall to the Seljuk dynasty in 1085, Antioch was the last Byzantine fortification in Syria. Yaghi-Siyan was made Governor of Antioch in 1087 and held the position when the crusaders arrived in 1097.
Yaghi-Siyan was aware of the approaching Crusader army as it marched through Anatolia in 1097; the city stood between the Crusaders and Palestine. Though under Turkish control, the majority of Antioch's inhabitants were Christians. Yaghi-Siyan had previously been tolerant of the Christian populace, however that changed as the Crusaders approached. To prepare for their arrival he imprisoned the Eastern Orthodox Patriarch of Antioch, John the Oxite, turned St Peter's Cathedral into a stable and expelled many leading Christians from the city. Yaghi-Siyan then sent out appeals for help: his request was turned down by Ridwan of Aleppo because of personal animosity, however Yaghi-Siyan was more successful in his approaches to other nobles in the region: Duqaq of Damascus, Toghtekin, Kerbogha, the sultans of Baghdad and Persia, and the emir of Homs all agreed to send reinforcements. Meanwhile, Yaghi-Siyan began stockpiling supplies in anticipation of a siege.
Knowing they had to capture Antioch, the Crusaders considered how best to go about the task. Attrition suffered during the army's long journey across Anatolia meant the leaders considered leaving an assault until reinforcements arrived in spring. Tatikios, the Byzantine advisor to the crusade, suggested adopting tactics similar to those used by the Byzantines when they moved to capture Antioch in 968. They had installed themselves at Baghras some 12 miles (19 km) away and from there conducted a blockade of the city by cutting off its lines of communication. Raymond IV, Count of Toulouse, was alone in advocating assaulting the city. In the end, the Crusaders chose to advance on Antioch and establish a siege close to Antioch.
First siege
Starting the siege
Before the siege could be properly started, the control of three key sites was essential: the town of Artah, the Iron Bridge across the Orontes, and the harbour of St Simeon. Artah's importance resulted from its strategic position as it was situated on vital routes connecting the Euphrates and the Orontes valleys as well as Apamea, Aleppo and Antioch. A detachment of the Crusade army led by Robert of Flanders was sent to take Artah but discovered that the local Armenian population had ejected the Turkish garrison and welcomed Robert and his forces with supplies for men and horses. Yaghi-Siyan then sent a force to retake Artah, but this force retreated upon arrival of the main army of the Crusaders.
On 20 October 1097 the Crusaders reached the Iron Bridge, a fortified crossing on the Orontes River 12 miles (19 km) outside Antioch. Robert and Adhemar of Le Puy, the Catholic Bishop of Puy-en-Velay, led the charge across the bridge, opening the way for the advancing army. Bohemond of Taranto took a vanguard along the river's south bank and headed towards Antioch on 21 October, and the Crusaders established themselves outside the city's north wall. The Crusaders divided into several groups. Bohemond camped outside Saint Paul's Gate near the northernmost corner of the city walls and immediately to the west were Hugh I, Count of Vermandois; Robert Curthose, Duke of Normandy; Robert II; and Stephen, Count of Blois. Adhemar and Raymond took up positions outside the Dog Gate either side of where the Orontes penetrated Antioch's defences. Godfrey of Bouillon was stationed west of the Duke's Gate in the northwest of the city walls. The bridge across the Orontes outside Antioch's west walls remained under Yaghi-Siyan's control at this point. The ensuing nine-month siege has been described as "one of the great sieges of the age".
The sources emphasise that a direct assault would have failed. For instance, Raymond of Aguilers notes that the chaplain of Raymond IV said "[Antioch] is so well fortified that it need not fear attack by machinery nor the assault of man, even if all mankind came together against it". According to Fulcher of Chartres, the leaders resolved to maintain the siege until the city was forced into submission. Though his figures may not be accurate, Raymond of Aguilers gives an account of the army defending the city: "There were, furthermore, in the city two thousand of the best knights, and four or five thousand common knights and ten thousand more footmen".
One of the problems of camping so close to the city was that it left the besiegers vulnerable to sorties from the garrison and even missiles. For the first fortnight of the siege, the Crusaders were able to forage in the surrounding area as the defenders chose not to leave the safety of the city walls. However, in November Yaghi-Siyan learned that the Crusaders felt the city would not fall to an assault so was able to turn his attentions from the defensive to harrying the besiegers. He mobilised his cavalry and began harassing the besiegers. With the immediate area stripped clean, the Crusaders' foraging parties had to search further afield for supplies leaving them more vulnerable and on several occasions were attacked by the garrisons of nearby fortifications. Yaghi-Siyan's men also used the Dog Bridge outside the Dog Gate to harass the Crusaders. Adhemar Raymond's men, who were camped closest to the bridge, attempted to destroy it using picks and hammers, but made little impact on the strong structure while under missile fire from Antioch's defenders. Another attempt was made to render the bridge unusable, this time with a mobile shelter to protect the Crusaders, but the garrison sortied and successfully drove them away. Soon after, three siege engines were built opposite the Dog Gate. In the end, the Crusaders erected a blockade on the bridge to obstruct potential sorties.
The port of St Symeon on the Mediterranean coast, 9 miles (14 km) west of Antioch would allow the Crusaders to bring reinforcements. Raymond of Aguilers mentions that the English landed at the port before the crusade reached Antioch, but he did not record whether a battle for control of St Symeon took place. Reinforcements in the form of 13 Genoese ships reached St Symeon on 17 November, and though the route from Antioch to St Symeon ran close to the city walls—meaning the garrison could impede travel—the Genoese joined up with the rest of the Crusaders. According to Genoese chronicler Caffaro di Rustico da Caschifellone, the Genoese suffered heavy casualties en route from St Symeon to Antioch. Bohemond's troops built a counterfort outside Saint Paul's Gate in Antioch's northeast wall to protect themselves against missiles from Antioch's defenders. Known as Malregard, the fort was built on a hill and probably consisted of earthen ramparts. The construction has been dated to around the time the Genoese arrived. The Crusaders were further bolstered by the arrival of Tancred, who set up camp to the west of his uncle Bohemond.
Winter
As the Crusaders' food supply reached critical levels in December, Godfrey fell ill. On 28 December, Bohemond and Robert of Flanders took about 20,000 men and went foraging for food and plunder upstream of the Orontes. Knowing the Crusaders' force had been divided, Yaghi-Siyan waited until the night of 29 December before making a sortie. He attacked Raymond's encampment across the river, and though caught by surprise Raymond was able to recover and turn Yaghi-Siyan's men back. He almost succeeded in reversing the attack entirely, forcing a way across the bridge and establishing a foothold on the other side and holding open the city gates. As the Crusaders threatened to take the city, a horse lost its rider, and in the ensuing confusion in the dark, the Crusaders panicked and withdrew across the bridge with the Seljuks in pursuit. The stalemate was restored, and both sides had suffered losses.
While Raymond was repulsing a sally from Antioch's garrison, an army under the leadership of Duqaq of Damascus was en route to relieve Antioch. Bohemond and Robert of Flanders were unaware that their foraging party was heading towards Duqaq's men. On 30 December news reached Duqaq while his army was at Shaizar that the Crusaders were nearby. On the morning of 31 December Duqaq marched towards Bohemond and Robert's army, and the two met at the village of Albara. Robert was the first to encounter Duqaq's men as he was marching ahead of Bohemond. Bohemond joined the battle and with Robert fought back Duqaq's army and inflicted heavy casualties. Though they fought off Duqaq's army, which retreated to Hama, the Crusaders suffered too many casualties to keep foraging and returned to Antioch. As a result of the fight the Crusaders lost the flock they had gathered for food and returned with less food than they needed.
The month ended inauspiciously for both sides: there was an earthquake on 30 December, and the following weeks saw such unseasonably bad rain and cold weather that Duqaq had to return home without further engaging. The Crusaders feared the rain and earthquake were signs they had lost God's favour, and to atone for their sins such as pillaging, Adhemar ordered that a three-day fast should be observed. In any case at this time supplies were running dangerously low, and soon after one in seven men was dying of starvation.