I just started reading Stephen Howarth's "The Knights Templar" and the following line appears:
"...the gradual growth of primogeniture gave each succeeding generation of the eleventh-century nobility an increasing number of young sons, landless, frequently penniless, and with only one trade: war."
He later goes on to say that a practical advantage of cooperating with the Byzantine Emperor was that Urban could rid himself of "belligerent western knights" whose infighting was wreaking havoc in Western Europe.
I'm wondering if this was a primary motivation for Urban's speech at Clermont or just a happy by-product?
Also, any thoughts on the book itself? I'm going to finish reading it either way as I am enjoying it, I'd just like to know if there are any majors downsides I should be aware of. I've always been fascinated with the Templars and I don't know anything about them.
I'll give it a try.
One can't stress enough the religious motivation of a medieval person. While there may have been crusaders who saw the opportunity of gaining land and wealth the crusade was mainly a pilgrimage. Of course Urban saw the opportunity to mend the schism, but even that is a religious motivation.
A lot of the first crusaders weren't landless sons, but the military and aristocratic elite of Europe itself. They pawned or sold their land, some even went into huge debts just so they could journey to the holy land. A famous example would be Robert, Duke of Normandy, son of William "the Conqueror", who pawned his duchy for 10.000 marks to his brother William "Rufus".
So, while I admittedly don't know much about hereditary rights during the High Middle Ages, I can say that it wasn't just secondary sons who sought to try their luck in Palestine.
I can't say much about Stephen Howarth. But if you're interested in the topic of crusades in general, let the following works be recommended to you:
Housley, Norman J., Fighting for the cross. Crusading to the Holy Land, New Haven 2008. Mayer, Hans Eberhard, Geschichte der Kreuzzüge, Stuttgart 2005. Tyerman, Christophr, God's war. A new history of the Crusades, Cambridge 2006.
Hope I could be of help.
I cannot speak of the impact of primogeniture itself, especially since my understanding is that primogeniture is not the norm during the 11th century and is just beginning. Also, I think it would be a step too far to say that the Crusade was an attempt to rid Europe of these belligerent young men would be a step too far. However, all of the young aristocratic men during this period are one of the reasons that the First Crusade drew such so many followers.
After becoming a knight, a young aristocratic man was expected to travel around with a band of his friends, mostly other young aristocratic knights. Mostly, they would travel around and assist in conflicts to gain glory and prestige for themselves. This time in their lives could last a very long time, and would generally continue until he married and settled down.
As one can imagine, conflicts were rampant with the country side filled with all these young men looking for trouble. If they could not find a conflict to join, they would create a conflict themselves. Many churchmen tried to establish 'peace days', such as prohibiting violence on Tuesdays and Thursdays, to cut down on the violence.
So when Urban calls the crusade, there is already this group of skilled traveling fighters who find the prospect of fighting for god to be an answer to a lot of their problems. Not only do they get to fight, but now they get to do so on behalf of god.
I have not read any of Howarth's works, but if you are interested in the crusades you should read The Crusades: A Reader by Emily Amt and S.J. Allen. It is a great collection of primary source documents on the crusades, and contains many primary source documents about the problem of these roving bands of belligerent men as well as why the prospect of fighting for god was so attractive.