History of the Crusades

the Crusades Episode 20 the Crusader States the County of Odessa and the County of Tripoli.

Hello again.

Last week we looked at the fortunes of one of the Crusader States,

the Principality of Antioch.

This week we will take a closer look at Antioch's neighboring states, the counties of Odessa

and Tripoli.

You might recall way back in episode 10 that the county of Odessa was the first

crusader state to be established.

It was created by Godfrey de Boulion's brother, Baldwin of Boulogne, who named

himself Count Baldwin of Odessa. I've posted a map of the Crusaders on the website at history of the Crusades dot webs.com

and you can see from just glancing at the map that of all the states, Idessa looks to be the most vulnerable.

The other three states, the Principality of Antioch, the county of Tripoli, and the kingdom of Jerusalem all hug the coast with their

eastern borders not stretching too far into Muslim territory. Not so with the county of Idessa.

It has no coastal territory.

It shares its western border with the state of Antioch,

while the remainder of the territory juts out like a peninsula into

Muslim lands.

Like Antioch, the area covered by the county of Odessa was once part of the Byzantine Empire, and as such contains a fair amount of native Christians, mainly Syrian Jacobites and Armenians.

However, in the more recent past it has been under Selyok Turk rule

and as such also contains a fair amount of Muslims.

If you're getting the idea that the area covered by the county of Odessa

...