Hello everyone and welcome to the history of Byzantium, Episode 255,

The Third Crusade, Part 1.

Last time we heard how the Sultan of Egypt, Saladin, took control of Nur al-Din's empire

and used its resources to crush the kingdom of Jerusalem.

Utramia was always outmaned and outgunned by its Muslim neighbours,

but no one had been able to bring that superiority to bear until Saladin came along.

Once the Crusader army had been annihilated, nothing stood between the Sultan and Jerusalem itself.

The Holy City quickly surrendered on the 2nd of October 1187.

As you can imagine, news of this disaster spread rapidly towards Western Europe

and Pope Gregory VIII immediately called for a new crusade to rescue Utramia.

As I mentioned two episodes ago, the timing couldn't have been worse for Isaac Anglos.

The new emperor was struggling to keep control of the Roman world.

He could barely trust his own nobles, the Bulgarian rebellion was gathering steam,

and he just learnt of a new uprising in Anatolia.

This was led by the governor of Philadelphia, Theodore Mangafas.

Philadelphia was the capital of the revived Thracchusian theme,

and with little support coming from Constantinople, Theodore was left alone

to deal with a nasty Turkic raid the year before.

So he did what all the nobility were doing these days.

He declared himself emperor and stopped sending tax to the capital.

Isaac took his army across the waters and besieged Philadelphia early in 1189,

but reports soon reached him that a German-led army of Crusaders was on the move

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