Balian of Ibelin

A nobleman who was actually a noble man.

Balian of Ibelin was highlighted as an important historical figure most recently in the movie Kingdom of Heaven, but there was some changes to his story that did a disservice to the quality of his character and downplayed how much he did for the ‘little guys’ caught in the middle of the crusades.

Balian was the youngest son of Barsian of Ibelin in the crusader kingdom of Jerusalem sometime in the late 1140s to early 1150s. It seemed that his oldest brother, Hugh, took responsibility for Balian when their father passed away. Hugh received the title and land that was passed down in their father’s death. Unfortunately, Hugh died not long after and the land and title went to the next brother in line; Baldwin. Baldwin had his mother’s land and title to deal with and left the castle to Balian.

Balian first entered history on a notable level at the Battle of Montgisard where a victory was attributed to his brother, Baldwin, and him. They had grown up very close to where the battle was fought and their knowledge of the area led to the success of the fight. Balian’s mention in regards to the outcome is extremely impressive because he did not have a title or baron-ship.

It’s unclear what else he did while in the battle, but he must have kicked some serious butt because King Baldwin IV approved Balian’s marriage to Dowager Queen of Jerusalem Maria Comnena. At face value, this marriage was kind of a nut-so move for all concerned parties; Balian had no title and no real land of his own and, well, she was a Queen. Baldwin officially transferred the land and title of Ibelin to Balian to make the marriage less lopsided.

From here, Balian, his new wife, and new step-daughter Isabella were embroiled in the petty drama typical for royalty and land grabbers. I’ll admit that I find these power disputes tedious and frustrating, so I won’t get into what all was going on. To make things as simple as possible, here are the bare bones: with the death of King Baldwin IV from leprosy and the death of his successor, King Baldwin V (who was super young when he took the throne), there was a power vacuum that needed filling and there were two main parties vying for the spotlight.

Guy de Lusignan eventually took the throne while the threat of Saladin, the Muslim sultan of Egypt and Syria, and his giant army loomed ever closer. Guy marched the army north to meet the coming army, and in a stroke of insanity, decided to march his army across a dry and barren plain without water, against the advice of his barons.

Needless to say, the battle did not end in Guy’s favor and Balian was only one of three barons that escaped. It’s not clear how he got out without being imprisoned.

After the defeat of Guy and his army (which was the bulk of the Jerusalem army), the towns surrounding Jerusalem quickly fell, with the exception of Tyre and some isolated castles, until the city was essentially surrounded. Balian had escaped to Tyre, but hearing Saladin’s army was at the gates of Jerusalem, Balian approached Saladin about safe conduct so he could ride into the city and rescue his wife and children. Saladin agreed so long as he was there only one night and would not raise arms against him again. Balian agreed.

Once he was there, however, the people in the city saw the arrival of a battle-tested baron as a gift from God and begged him to stay and help. It’s estimated that 60,000 to 100,000 people were enclosed within the walls of Jerusalem, trying to hide from Saladin. Balian saw the importance of saving these people as trumping the oath he made to Saladin and agreed. After making arrangements to get his family out, he set to work.

With the Jerusalem army virtually gone, there were as many as fourteen knights (or as few as two) within the city walls. Queen Sybilla was unresponsive, so Balian basically called all the shots. He created sixty to eighty new knights and readied for the inevitable siege by storing as much food and money as he could. There were approximately fifty women and children to every man in the city, so he really didn’t have a lot with which to work.

After making preparations, they sealed the city. Balian, with his rag-tag army held off the Saracen army for four days, even kicking butt so well they managed to drive them all the way back to their camp and caused Saladin to deploy his army at a different section of the wall. Four days after this re-deployment, thirty meters of wall fell, leaving the city indefensible.

The Saracens flooded into the city and Balian proceeded to prove he had the biggest cajones available to mankind; he told Saladin he wanted to negotiate. Saladin felt the need to point out that you don’t negotiate the surrender of a city that has already fallen. As he was pointing to his banners flying on the walls of the city, they both watched as the banners were thrown down and replaced with the city’s banners. Balian calmly pointed out that they should negotiate or the city’s defenders would kill all of Saracens in the city, kill the inhabitants (probably a better choice than what might come at the hands of the Saracens), desecrate and destroy every temple and religious site (regardless of religion), then saunter right on out and fight until the last man.

I don’t know if Saladin thought Balian was absolutely bat guano crazy or if he respected the heck out of him (probably a little of both), but he gave the inhabitants of Jerusalem 40 days to raise ransoms for their passage to safety.

Balian emptied his own coffers and every coffer he could find in Jerusalem; offering 30,000 dinars for 18,000 paupers. There’s no real way of knowing the exchange rate in comparison with today’s money, but it had to have been a ton of money. He used every resource he could find in Jerusalem and even offered to stand surety for ransoms while they raised money in the west to meet the leftover ransoms. Despite his promises, Saladin refused and around 15,000 people were marched off as slaves.

The amount of people he saved varies from account to account, one says 15,000, another says 40-60,000. Either way, he worked to ensure even those who couldn’t pay their own ransom would still go free.

The rest of Balian’s life is pretty interesting; still a lot of political intrigue, but I find it fascinating that he gave up so much to ensure the poorest of the poor in Jerusalem had a chance of getting out free. He also saw the value of human life over his own word. He was a nobleman in the truest sense of the word.

Resources:

It’s not super accurate (the relationships in this movie are all messed up), but I love the movie Kingdom of Heaven.

There are also several historical fiction books about him, but I don’t know how accurate they are or how good they are. Let me know if you’ve read any!

References:

https://military-history.fandom.com/wiki/Balian_of_Ibelin

https://www.crusaderkingdoms.com/balian-d-ibelin.html

https://medium.com/lessons-from-history/balian-of-ibelin-the-man-who-defended-jerusalem-against-saladin-49fea315c99