When this request was put to the more important aristocrats on the expedition, some objected strongly to any suggestion that they – leaders in their own lands – should pay obeisance to any man at all, let alone to Alexios, to whom they owed no obligation or duty. The objections were vociferous: ‘This our leaders flatly refused to do, and they said “Truly, this is unworthy of us, and it seems unjust that we should swear to him any oath at all.”’84 Complaints were not unanimous, though: Hugh of Vermandois, Stephen of Blois and others were willing to swear loyalty to the emperor. This was perhaps because they had been so well looked after in Constantinople, but there would also have been an element of pragmatism, given that they needed the help and support of the emperor to make it to Jerusalem. As one eyewitness reported, ‘To these, then, the emperor himself offered as many coins and silken garments as he pleased; also some horses and some money, which they needed to complete such a great journey.’85 This was acknowledged by the author of the Gesta Francorum who, consistently hostile to Alexios and Byzantium, struggled to understand why oaths were given by the expedition’s leaders. ‘Why did such brave and determined knights do a thing like this? It must have been because they were driven by desperate need.’86
Bohemond, meanwhile, had his eye on a bigger prize, suggesting to Alexios that he should be appointed to lead the imperial army in the east – a position that presumably still lay vacant following the disgrace of Adrian Komnenos, the military’s previous commander-inchief.87 With everything to gain from the expedition and little to lose, Bohemond from the outset sought to position himself as the emperor’s right-hand man; he was quick to see that there were serious opportunities if he played his hand well.88
When agreement was finally reached with Godfrey of Bouillon after the fighting over the winter of 1096–7, part of the settlement was that the duke would take the oath to Alexios as others had already done. When he did so, ‘he received generous amounts of money, and he was invited to share Alexios’ hearth and table and was entertained at a magnificent banquet ... The emperor then gave orders that plentiful supplies should be made available for his men.’89
The oaths had two separate and distinct purposes for Alexios. The first was the long-term aim of ensuring that all future gains made by the western knights across Asia Minor would revert to him in due course. But there was a short-term goal too: to safeguard his own position in Constantinople as the Crusaders gathered in Byzantium. The latter lay behind the compromise reached with Raymond of Toulouse, who rebuffed Alexios’ demand for homage point-blank: ‘Raymond responded that he had not taken the Cross to pay allegiance to another lord, or to be in the service of any other than the One for whom he had abandoned his native land and his paternal goods.’90
For a time, the count’s refusal to take the pledge threatened to destabilise the expedition, both by delaying its progress and also because other leaders had already given commitments to the emperor. Robert of Flanders, Godfrey of Bouillon and Bohemond, all of whom had sworn the oath, urged Raymond to do the same, to little avail. Eventually, a compromise was reached: ‘At this juncture, following consultation with his men, the count swore that neither he nor those in his service would harm the emperor’s life or deprive him of his possessions.’ He continued to insist, however, that he would not pay homage ‘because of the peril to his rights’.91 The fact that Alexios was prepared to accept this compromise reveals his primary concern: with the Crusader camp outside the city walls, the emperor required re assurance that his life and position was not under threat.
With Bohemond too Alexios was prepared to be flexible and accommodating. The Norman agreed to become the emperor’s vassal in return for a specific agreement: ‘the emperor said that if he willingly took the oath to him, he would give him, in return, land in extent from Antioch fifteen days’ journey, and eight in width. And [Alexios] swore to him that if he loyally observed the oath, he would never pass beyond his own land.’92 Yet the value of this concession was negligible; if anything, it was to the empire’s advantage. Encouraging Bohemond to take over lands that were beyond the empire’s traditional frontiers could result in the creation of a buffer zone between Byzantium and the Turks. From the Norman’s point of view, he would use the massive Crusader army for his own gains; this was particularly attractive given his limited prospects in southern Italy where his halfbrother and his uncle held sway. It was, in other words, an agreement from which both men stood to gain.
Bohemond was so pleased by the prospect of carving out a realm for himself that he intervened on Alexios’ behalf during the latter’s negotiations with Raymond of Toulouse. It was Bohemond who cajoled and eventually even threatened the most powerful member of the expedition, telling Raymond that if he continued to refuse to take the oath, he would take direct action against him personally.93 This endeared Bohemond to the rank and file of the entire expedition, who saw the disagreements between the leaders as distractions from the matter in hand of taking on the Turks in Asia Minor. Bohemond therefore took the credit for keeping the momentum of the Crusade going. It also endeared him to Alexios, who came to see his former rival as a valuable ally, someone with common sense and a common touch – in short, someone he could rely on.
Although the emperor had immediate concerns in 1096–7, as the Crusaders arrived in Byzantium, he also had an eye on long-term strategy when formalising his relations with the expedition’s leaders. He was particularly concerned about what would happen to towns and regions that were to be taken by the westerners as they crossed Asia Minor. This issue was addressed explicitly in the oaths that were made in Constantinople. Godfrey of Bouillon, along with other leading western knights, ‘came to the emperor and swore on oath that whatever towns, lands or forts he might in future subdue that had in the first place belonged to the Roman Empire, would be handed over to the officer appointed by the emperor for this very purpose’.94
Reports of this arrangement quickly spread well beyond Byzantium, becoming widely known in the Muslim world. Well-informed commentators writing in Baghdad and Damascus knew the outline of the terms that had been concluded in the imperial capital. One wrote that when the Crusaders arrived in Byzantium, ‘the Franks, on their first appearance had made a covenant with the king of the Greeks, and had promised him that they would deliver over to him the first city that they captured’.95 Another focused on the determination and resolve shown by Alexios to get what he had wanted: ‘the Byzantine emperor refused them passage through his territory. He said, “I will not allow you to cross into the lands of Islam until you swear to me that you will surrender Antioch to me.”’96
Latin sources noted not only the commitments given by the western leaders but also those offered in return by Alexios. ‘The emperor’, wrote the author of the Gesta Francorum, ‘for his part guaranteed good faith and security to all our men, and swore also to come with us, bringing an army and a navy, and faithfully to supply us with provisions both by land and sea, and to take care to restore all those things which had been lost. Moreover, he promised he would not cause or permit anyone to trouble or vex our pilgrims on the way to the Holy Sepulchre.’97