I thought the Templers where the crusaders from Europe and the Knights of Antioch were the dwellers?
Educate me!
Err no. In 1099, the Crusades were officially launched in first scale. The Crusaders were composed of mostly French, Italian Normans, and Normans from Normandy...in other words, these guys wanted a fight. They weren't necessarily motivated by religion (one of the greatest misconceptions of our age) but they liked profit--many of the Normans had fought against the Byzantine Emperor a few years before--now they were supposed to be fighting to defend his empire from the rapacious Saracens!
Anyway, the sheer vigor of their arrival drove the disorganized Arab states back, and the Crusaders carved up many states. Antioch was one, the Kingdom of Jerusalem was another, and the Principality of Tyre was a key region as well. I think I'm missing another state, but these were essentially kingdoms of their own in "Outremer" (meaning foreign land).
The Knights Templar were a group sworn to protect the Temple of Solomon, and they were essentially warrior monks in behavior and ritual. They were very well organized, but certainly not as ideological as some might think. Although they were devoutly Christian (at least initially) they realized that outright war with the Muslims would be impossible--many of their serfs and peasants were Muslim, and they were not keen to lose everything they had in some massive war.
Now remember, many of these Crusaders established Kingdoms. But many Europeans went home. They wanted to see their families, bring home the strange spices, etc. So this meant that from the start, the Crusades were seen more of an adventure, a way to gain experience, and less about Imperialism or even Religion as many revisionist historians seek to portray (Like Howard Zinn, RIP...).
So every so often, a big amount of knights would come to Outremer on "Crusade." There were around 9 official BIG Crusades, only the 1st, 3rd, and 6th were arguably successful in their goals, but in between such massive crusades, you had traders going back and forth, and soldiers and so forth going all over the place. The world was not static, even back then, although it certainly moved at a far slower pace than it does today.
Neither were religious allegiances static. Nationalism is a really an 18th century invention, but before that, people swore fealty to a lord. In that sense, that's all that really mattered. If your lord converted to Christianity, and you were a knight serving him, you'd convert too. If he converted back to Islam, so would you. Very rarely were there "mixed" households, although that was certainly possible as well.
In between the Crusades, the kingdoms of Outremer fought as much against each other as they did with the enemy Muslims they were all supposed to be united against.
In Kingdom of Heaven,
Reynald de Chatallion is portrayed as a rapacious Christian pirate and raider, preying upon the poor Muslims.
While he was a pirate, he was not a Templar (the
Templars spent a great deal of effort killing raiders and pirates of all religious allegiances, although they had a navy that could act as a privateer force) and he preyed upon Christian and Muslim merchantmen with equal veracity.
So you can see, it was a lot more complicated than just "Muslim vs. Christian," there were many cultural norms that we are simply unaware of today.
The Hashishaam were another example. They're made popular by Assassin's Creed, and they did exist. They killed both Christians and Muslims, depending on who hired them, but while they were a lot more skilled than just hired thugs, they certainly had no real motivations other than money. I believe Mamluks wiped out their stronghold in the 13th century.
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