some notorious act of depredation against a religious community. We
have already noted the most memorable examples, from Walter I in the
1070s and 1080s to his great-grandson, Erard II, a hundred years later.
During the intervening century, though, Brienne participation in the
‘business of the Holy Land’could well have done much to boost the
family’s standing among both clergy and laity. Like so many other
leading aristocratic dynasties in Champagne, the Briennes established a
‘family tradition’of crusading over the course of the long twelfth cen-
tury.^95 As a result, it is easy to assume that a count of Brienne partici-
pated in every major crusade, from the First down to the Third (and,
indeed, beyond that). On closer examination, though, there are good
reasons to doubt this. Building on d’Arbois de Jubainville’s‘Catalogue’,
a number of scholars have supposed that, soon after losing his‘war of
independence’against Count Hugh of Champagne, Erard I honourably
exited the region on the First Crusade, having made satisfaction for his
sins against the monastery of Montier-en-Der.^96 However, Bouchard has
demonstrated that the undated charter which states that Erard was
leaving for the Holy Land (‘iturus esset Iherosolimam’)fits much better
in the context of events that took place in 1114, rather than at the time of
the First Crusade.^97 It is also worth noting that, in 1114, Erard’s lord,
Count Hugh, set out on his second expedition to Jerusalem.^98 It is
plausible to suggest, then, that Erard’s journey to the Holy Land was
not a part of the First Crusade at all. Rather, he accompanied his lord
there almost twenty years later.^99 Moreover, there are various subsidiary
points that support this contention. First, it could play its part infilling
the awkward hiatus in Brienne history, between 1114 and the early
1130s, which has already been mentioned. Perhaps this fallow period
covers Erard’s absence in the Latin East, his last few years in Champagne
up until his death in the early to mid-1120s, and then the minority of his
son and heir, Walter II. Furthermore, there is some concrete evidence
to corroborate the idea that the Briennes were active in the Holy Land
in the 1110s, rather than in the 1090s. A mysterious Henry of Brienne
(^95) See N. L. Paul, To Follow in Their Footsteps: The Crusades and Family Memory in the High
Middle Ages(New York, 2012), for how such traditions were constructed.
(^96) Above all, see Roserot,Dictionnaire, i, 243, which draws on‘Catalogue’, nos. 20, 31 and
36, with a cavalier regard for their supposed dates. For an alternative view of Erard’s
‘pilgrimage’to the Holy Land, see J. Riley-Smith,The First Crusaders, 1095– 1131
(Cambridge, 1997), 167 n. 139.
(^97) The Cartulary of Montier-en-Der, no. 146. See also no. 133, and‘Catalogue’, no. 31,
98 which certainly date from 1114.
99 Ibid., no. 31; and d’Arbois de Jubainville,Histoire, ii, 114–9.
By contrast, there is no evidence at all to suggest that Erard accompanied Hugh on the
latter’sfirst expedition to the Holy Land in 1104.
First Footsteps in the Holy Land 29