Count Emicho of Flonheim's German Crusade army of 1096 — the one that conducted the Rhineland massacres of Jews at Mainz, Worms, and Cologne — never reached the Holy Land. What stopped it?
Coloman refused passage on the grounds that Emicho's force had no papal authorisation and had been committing massacres. Emicho attempted to force passage; the Hungarian royal army defeated the Crusader force in a series of engagements culminating at the Battle of Wieselburg in late August 1096. Emicho escaped with a small remnant. The destruction was widely interpreted in the subsequent Catholic tradition as divine punishment for the unauthorised anti-Jewish violence — but the interpretation produced no institutional reform of the Crusade movement.
Read the full story →Count Emicho of Flonheim led the unofficial 'German Crusade' of 1096 — the substantial armed band that conducted the Mainz, Worms, and Cologne massacres of Rhineland Jews. The army never reached Constantinople. King Coloman of Hungary destroyed it in a series of military engagements in late summer 1096. Emicho himself survived and returned home in disgrace.