Crusades 203defend itself against the khans of the Golden Horde, their
successors, the rulers of the Great Horde, and the
encroachments of the Italian colonies of Caffa and Tana
on the Black Sea. The second issue was OTTOMANexpan-
sionism. In 1475 the TURKS conquered the Genoese
colonies in the Crimea and later extended their domina-
tion over the entire southern coast of Crimea.
Further reading:Alan W. Fisher, The Crimean Tatars
(Stanford, Calif.: Hoover Institution Press, 1978).
Croatia Croatia in the Middle Ages was a Slavic state
in the northwestern Balkan Peninsula. The origin of the
Croatians, the Hrvati, has been controversial. According
to CONSTANTINE VII Porphyrogenitos’s On Imperial
Administration,the Croats migrated in the early seventh
century into the Balkan Peninsula at the invitation of the
emperor HERAKLEIOS, who sought their aid against the
AVARS. Having defeated the Avars, they settled down and
converted to Christianity, becoming nominal subjects of
BYZANTIUM. The lordship of CHARLEMAGNEwas accepted
in 803, but in 879, when it was obvious Frankish power
had declined, the Croats switched their loyalty to the
PAPACYand so, in effect, then became independent of the
Eastern Empire.
At various moments, when advantageous, Croatia
later allied itself with Byzantium, as did Prince TOMISLAV,
for fear of SIMEON of Bulgaria. Byzantine influence
declined in Croatia especially after 1060, when the liturgy
in Church Slavonic came to be prohibited. By this time
Croatia’s orientation had shifted permanently to central
and western or Roman Catholic Europe, usually under
the lordship of HUNGARY, then the Angevins, then the
HABSBURGS.VENICEwas able to control its coastline on
the Adriatic Sea.
See alsoDALMATIA;DUBROVNIK.
Further reading: Stanko Guldescu, History of
Medieval Croatia(The Hague: Mouton, 1964); Francis
Ralph Preveden, A History of the Croatian People from
Their Arrival on the Shores of the Adriatic to the Present
Day, with Some Account of the Gothic, Roman, Greek, Illyr-
ian, and Prehistoric Periods of the Ancient Illyricum and
Pannonis, 2 vols. (New York: Philosophical Library,
1955–1962); George J. Prpic, Croatia and the Croatians: A
Selected and Annotated Bibliography in English(Scottsdale,
Ariz.: Associated Book Publishers, 1982).
crossbow SeeWEAPONS AND WEAPONRY.
crucifix and Crucifixion The representation of the
cross or the Crucifixion with Christ on it developed and
changed in Western and Byzantine art over the course of
the Middle Ages. During the second and third centuries,
most crosses were bare. The bare cross was intended to
be a sign of sacrifice for human salvation, rather than a
concrete reminder of the actual Passion of Christ. Some-
times it was depicted in preference to an explicit image of
Christ. There was reluctance to show straightforward
image of GOD, let alone the suffering of God on an igno-
minious instrument of torture. At the time crucifixion
was reserved for especially vicious bandits and thieves.
This attitude and artistic taste favored triumphal forms of
God such as Christ in majesty and his ASCENSION,so
crosses were represented alone, and often with no icono-
graphical context or embellishment. In the apse of his
new church of Saint Irene, under the emperor CONSTAN-
TINEin the fourth century, there was a great cross that did
not bear Christ. Christ was depicted in majesty either on
the ceiling, between the Sun and the Moon, as in Saint
John Lateran in Rome, or in a medallion, as in San Ste-
fano Rotondo. Crosses in the time of JUSTINIANcontinued
to be bare.
From the fourth to the 12th century, crucifixes and
Crucifixions celebrated the majesty of Christ. The idea of
majestic kingship explicitly changed to that of Redemp-
tion by the sacrifice on the cross. After the first third of
the 12th century, crucifixes became graphic to tell the
story of Christ’s Passion. Theologians by the 12th century
saw the supposed shame of the cross as the sign of
Christ’s saving glory. The church and the state began to
appreciate the depiction of a suffering Christ crucified
between two hideously tortured thieves as an opportunity
to demonstrate the consequences of sin, capital punish-
ment, and crime to the faithful. These had become the
common themes of pastoral care, especially with the
advent of the MENDICANT ORDERS.
Further reading:Peter Harbison, The Crucifixion in
Irish Art: Fifty Selected Examples from the Ninth to the
Twentieth Century (Dublin: Columbia Press, 2000);
Mitchell B. Merback, The Thief, the Cross, and the Wheel:
Pain and the Spectacle of Punishment in Medieval and
Renaissance Europe(London: Reaktion, 1999); Barbara
Catherine Raw, Anglo-Saxon Crucifixion Iconography and
the Art of the Monastic Revival(Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1990); Ellen M. Ross, The Grief of God:
Images of the Suffering Jesus in Late Medieval England
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1997); Gertrud
Schiller, Iconography of Christian Art,2 vols., trans. Janet
Seligman (Greenwich, Conn.: New York Graphic Society,
1971–1972).crusader states SeeCRUSADES.Crusades The Crusades were a historical movement
primarily between 1096 and 1291 that arose in western
Europe to liberate the HOLYSEPULCHERfrom the Muslims
and restore Christian possession of it. The name, which
evolved in the 13th century, derived from the sign of
the cross, worn by participants. Various motives were
behind the Crusades for individuals and groups, but the