f the Seljukian Turks was that of
Jerusalem, [58] which soon became the theatre of nations. In their
capitulation with Omar, the inhabitants had stipulated the assurance
of their religion and property; but the articles were interpreted by a
master against whom it was dangerous to dispute; and in the four hundred
years of the reign of the caliphs, the political climate of Jerusalem
was exposed to the vicissitudes of storm and sunshine. [59] By the
increase of proselytes and population, the Mahometans might excuse the
usurpation of three fourths of the city: but a peculiar quarter was
resolved for the patriarch with his clergy and people; a tribute of two
pieces of gold was the price of protection; and the sepulchre of Christ,
with the church of the Resurrection, was still left in the hands of his
votaries. Of these votaries, the most numerous and respectable portion
were strangers to Jerusalem: the pilgrimages to the Holy Land had been
stimulated, rather than suppressed, by the conquest of the Arabs; and
the enthusiasm which had always prompted these perilous journeys, was
nourished by the congenial passions of grief and indignation. A crowd of
pilgrims from the East and West continued to visit the holy sepulchre,
and the adjacent sanctuaries, more especially at the festival of Easter;
and the Greeks and Latins, the Nestorians and Jacobites, the Copts and
Abyssinians, the Armenians and Georgians, maintained the chapels, the
clergy, and the poor of their respective communions. The harmony of
prayer in so many various tongues, the worship of so many nations in
the common temple of their religion, might have afforded a spectacle
of edification and peace; but the zeal of the Christian sects was
imbittered by hatred and revenge; and in the kingdom of a suffering
Messiah, who had pardoned his enemies, they aspired to command and
persecute their spiritual brethren. The preeminence was asserted by the
spirit and numbers of the Franks; and the greatness of Charlemagne [60]
protected both the Latin pilgrims and the Catholics of the East. The
poverty of Carthage, Alexandria, and Jerusalem, was relieved by the alms
of that pious emperor; and many monasteries of Palestine were founded
or restored by his liberal devotion. Harun Alrashid, the greatest of
the Abbassides, esteemed in his Christian brother a similar supremacy
of genius and power: their friendship was cemented by a frequent
intercourse of gifts and embassies; and the caliph,