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TheShepherds' Crusade of 1251 or thePastoureaux orPastorelli of 1251 was apopular crusade in northernFrance aimed at rescuingKing Louis IX during theSeventh Crusade.
In 1249, Saint Louis IX of France went away oncrusade, leaving his mother,Blanche of Castile, as regent during his absence. Louis was defeated and captured inEgypt at theBattle of Fariskur. When news of this reached France the next year, both nobles and peasants were deeply distressed; the king was well-loved and it was inconceivable to them that such a pious man could be defeated by heathens. Louis sent his brothers to France to get relief, where despite the efforts of Blanche of Castile, it was seen that neither the nobility nor the clergy were helping the king.[1]
A man, apparently an oldHungarian monk living in northern France, claimed he saw a vision of theVirgin Mary in which she told him to raise a peasant army to rescue King Louis. From about Easter 1251, a group of perhaps as many as 60,000 followed him, causing disruption, especiallyconflict with the clergy in several cities, and later began to attack the Jewish population. They never went beyond northern France as a large group, and were eventually dispersed by order of Blanche.
The violent attacks against Jews are described as medievalpogroms. Many of the victims were prominent and wealthy members of the community.[2]
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One of the outpourings of support took the form of a peasant movement in northern France, led by a man known as "the Master of Hungary" (Le Maître de Hongrie). He was apparently a very oldHungarian monk living in France, called Jacob.
The Master claimed to have been visited by theVirgin Mary, who instructed him to lead theshepherds (pastoreaux, hence the common nameCrusade of thePastoreaux) of France to theHoly Land to rescue Louis. His followers, said to number 60,000, were mostly young peasants, men, women, and children, fromBrabant,Hainaut,Flanders, andPicardy. They followed him toParis in May, where the Master met withBlanche of Castile. ChroniclerMatthew Paris thought he was an impostor, and that he was actually one of the leaders of theChildren's Crusade from earlier in the century.[3] Their movement in the city was restricted; they were not allowed to cross to theLeft Bank, where theUniversity of Paris was located, as Blanche perhaps feared another disturbance on the scale of the1229 University of Paris strike.
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The crowd of shepherds split up after leaving the city. Some of them went toRouen, where they expelled the archbishop and threw some priests into theSeine river. InTours they attackedmonasteries. The others under the Master arrived inOrléans on June 11. Here they were denounced by the bishop, whom they also attacked, along with other clerics, includingFranciscans andDominicans. They fought with theUniversity of Orléans students in the city as well, as Blanche might have feared would happen in Paris. Moving on toAmiens and thenBourges, they also began to attackJews.
Blanche responded by ordering the crowds to be rounded up andexcommunicated. This was done rather easily as they were simply wandering, directionless, around northern France, but the group led by the Master resisted outside Bourges, and the Master himself was killed in the ensuing skirmish.
The crusade seems to have been more of a revolt against the French church and nobility, who were thought to have abandoned Louis; the shepherds, of course, had no idea of what happened to Louis, nor the logistics involved in undertaking a crusade to rescue him. After being dispersed, some of the participants travelled toAquitaine andEngland, where they were forbidden to preach. Others took a truecrusade vow and may have actually gone on crusade.