Outremer, French for "overseas," was the general name given the Crusader states established after the First Crusade; County of Edessa, Principality of Antioch, County of Tripoli and especially the Kingdom of Jerusalem. The name was often used as an equivalent to Levant, Syria or Palestine, and incorporated areas that are today also part of Israel, Jordan, and Lebanon. Jump to: navigation, search Overseas, meaning literally a place over an ocean, the term is for some countries synonymous with the word international. ... The Crusader states, c. ... Jump to: navigation, search The First Crusade was launched in 1095 by Pope Urban II to regain control of the sacred city of Jerusalem and the Christian Holy Land from Muslims. ... Official language Latin, French, Italian, and other western languages; Greek and Arabic also widely spoken Capital Jerusalem, later Acre Constitution Various laws, so-called Assizes of Jerusalem The Kingdom of Jerusalem was a Christian kingdom established in the Levant in 1099 by the First Crusade. ... The Levant or Sham (Arabic root word related to the term Semite) is an approximate historical geographical term referring to a large area in Southwest Asia south of the Taurus Mountains, bounded by the Mediterranean Sea in the west, and the north Arabian Desert and Mesopotamia to the east. ... Jump to: navigation, search Map of the British Mandate of Palestine. ...
But Jerusalem came to be known as Outremer, the French word for "overseas," and as new generations grew up in the kingdom, they also began to think of themselves as natives, rather than immigrants.
Indeed, the sheer size of Frederick II's army and his stature before the Islamic world was sufficient to regain Jerusalem, Bethlehem, Nazareth, and a number of surrounding castles without a fight: these were recovered by treaty with the Ayyubid Sultan Al-Kamil.
However, the nobles of Outremer, led by the regent John of Ibelin, not only felt more could have been recovered militarily, but also resented his attempts to impose Imperial authority over their kingdom, resulting in a number of military confrontations both on the mainland and on Cyprus.
Outremer, "across the sea," means the states created and maintained by Crusaders and their descendants in the Middle East between 1098, during the First Crusade, and 1489, when Cyprus passed to Venice.
An interesting and romantic survivor of Outremer was, and is, the Sovereign Order of the Knights of the Hospital of St. John of Jerusalem, of Rhodes, and of Malta, the Hospitallers, who held Rhodes from 1309 to 1523 and Malta from 1530 to 1798.
This section is cross-indexed with Jerusalem, Outremer, Francia, and the Periphery of Francia (as part of Eastern Europe and Scandinavia).
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