Baldwin profits from the chronic rivalries among…
September 1101 CE
Baldwin profits from the chronic rivalries among his Muslim neighbors.
Although greatly outnumbered, he attacks the hostile Egyptians to consolidate his position.
Baldwin meets the Egyptians on September 7, 1101, at the Battle of Ramlah.
The Egyptians are led by Saad el-Dawleh, while Baldwin I, who has only two hundred and sixty cavalry and nine hundred foot soldiers, arrays his forced in six divisions to face an Egyptian force about ten thousand strong.
The first two divisions are wiped out in the initial attack but when the third division is pursued after being routed by the Egyptians, Baldwin orders a counterattack.
In vicious close-quarter combat, the crusaders repulse the Egyptian forces, who retreat in panic.
After pursuing the fleeing Fatimids to Ascalon, Baldwin returns to Ramla to plunder the Egyptian camp, although it is believed in Jerusalem that the crusader army had been defeated and Baldwin had been killed.
Tancred is prepared to take up the regency before it is finally reported that Baldwin has been victorious.
Baldwin fortifies the city, calling it Rames.
This success secures the Kingdom of Jerusalem against the Fatimid Caliphate's advances for the campaigning season.