Siege of Acre (1189–1191)

The struggle for the port of Acre, on the Gulf of Haifa, lasted nearly two years, from 28 August 1189 to 12 July 1191, and was the first major Christian counter-attack against Saladin and the central action of what became the Third Crusade. A Crusader army besieged the city while Saladin in turn surrounded the besiegers, and both sides were kept alive by ships. Its fall gave the Crusaders a new base on the coast, but at enormous cost in lives.

In 1187 Saladin, ruler of Egypt and Syria, destroyed the army of the Kingdom of Jerusalem at the Battle of Hattin, capturing King Guy, and then took much of Palestine, including Jerusalem itself after a short siege. The papacy called a new crusade. Tyre held out under Conrad of Montferrat, but when Saladin released Guy in 1188, Conrad refused to admit him. Reinforced by fleets from Sicily and Pisa, Guy marched south in August 1189 and camped outside Acre, an important harbour and one of Saladin's main garrisons and arsenals.

Guy began with perhaps 7,000 to 9,000 foot soldiers and 400 to 700 knights. A surprise assault failed, but contingents arrived by sea from Denmark, Frisia, France, Flanders, Germany and Italy, and Armenian troops also took part. Saladin came up with his army and attacked the camp, and on 4 October 1189 a pitched battle was fought east of the city. The Crusaders at first broke part of Saladin's line but scattered to plunder, and a sally by the garrison struck the Templars from behind; Christian losses were put at anything from 4,000 to 10,000. The camp nevertheless held, and Saladin, gathering ever larger forces, was soon besieging the besiegers while Muslim and Christian fleets fought to supply the city and the camp.

The siege dragged through 1190. Emperor Frederick Barbarossa drowned in the Saleph River on his way east in June, and only the remnant of his army arrived under his son. In the crowded camp, food ran short, water was fouled and epidemics killed many leaders. Queen Sibylla, through whom Guy held the throne, died along with their daughters, and the barons arranged for her half-sister Isabella to marry Conrad, opening a bitter dispute over the crown. In February 1191 Saladin managed to replace the exhausted garrison with fresh troops.

The balance changed in 1191. Philip II of France landed on 20 April, and Richard I of England on 8 June after conquering Cyprus on the way, reportedly bringing some 100 ships. Their siege engines battered the walls, and each breach drew an attack from Saladin's field army to relieve the defenders. After a final battle on 11 July, the garrison agreed terms on 12 July and the Crusaders entered the city. Leopold V of Austria left after a quarrel with Richard, and Philip sailed for home at the end of July.

Saladin was to pay a ransom and return Christian captives in instalments. When the first exchange broke down over which prisoners were included, Richard, judging that Saladin was stalling, had about 2,700 Muslim prisoners from the garrison beheaded on 20 August 1191. Saladin responded by executing the Christian prisoners in his hands. Afterwards he tended to demolish fortifications rather than defend them.

Richard marched south, defeated Saladin at Arsuf in September and took Jaffa, but never recaptured Jerusalem; the crusade ended by treaty in 1192. Acre became the capital of a reduced Kingdom of Jerusalem, a narrow coastal state that lasted another century until the siege of 1291. Casualty figures for the siege are uncertain, but losses on both sides were very heavy, and many historians regard the victory as a costly one that left the Crusaders too weak to retake the Holy City.

Our 1100 map shows the Crusader states soon after the First Crusade, and the 1200 map the reduced kingdom centred on Acre that the siege made possible.