Crusades In 1095, Pope Urban II called for the First Crusade in a sermon at the Council of Clermont. He encouraged military support for the Byzantine Empire and its Emperor, AlexiosI, who needed reinforcements for his conflict with westward migrating Turks colonizing Anatolia. One of Urban's aims was to guarantee pilgrims access to the Eastern Mediterranean holy sites that were under Muslim control but scholars disagree as to whether this was the primary motive for Urban or those who heeded his call. Urban's strategy may have been to unite the Eastern and Western branches of Christendom, which had been divided since
Giselbert, Count of Clermont daughter of Giselbert and obtained the title by marriage. The second is that the activities of the occupants of Clermont in 1095, Giselbert and Fredelon, who some regarded as brigandage, were perceived by these two as the legitimate levying of tolls on river traffic. A 1095 entry in the chronicle of Giles of Orval reveals that what Otbert's objective was accomplished by purchase. The acquisition of Clermont and its subsequent enfeoffment to his vassal Lambert was part of a consistent policy of purchase which also brought to the prince-bishop the important fortresses of Mirwart, Couvin and, Bouillon. This second theory