Crusaders pinned hopes on a prophecy of a Nubian king destroying Mecca

Evidence

Despite the euphoria, both Jacques and Oliver came to realize the vastness of the conquest they had launched. If Jacques had at first imagined a large but passive Eastern Christian population awaiting its Western savior, the crusaders soon began to hope for more tangible and active military allies, placing their hopes less in their own military successes than in the aid of mysterious Christians from afar. Both Jacques and Oliver tell of a book of ancient prophecy that was found in Damietta; its author, Jacques af- firms, is “an astrologer whom the Saracens hold as a great prophet.” It foretold, among other things, the successes of the first Crusade, the recapture of Jerusalem by Saladin, and even the capture of Damietta by the current Crusade. This book then predicts the subsequent Christian conquest of all Egypt and Syria. Oliver adds that this book predicted that “a certain king of the Christian Nubians was to destroy the city of Mecca and cast out the scattered bones of Muhammad, the false prophet, and certain other things which have not yet come to pass. If they are brought about, however, they will lead to the exaltation of Christianity and the suppression of the Agarenes.” — John V. Tolan, Saracens, 1027

Categorization

• QUESTION: Which actual Damietta prophecy text is this? Who authored it, and how did crusaders reconcile a Saracen astrologer’s book with Christian providence?
• SHARE: Would fascinate a medievalist friend — a Muslim-ruled Egyptian prophecy text being repurposed by Frankish invaders to foretell their own triumph.