Aicard Pope Urban II, the greatest of the Gregorian reformers after Gregory, travelled through Languedoc and Provence, visiting Montpellier, Nîmes, Saint-Gilles, Tarascon, Avignon, Aix, Cavaillon, and other cities, preaching the First Crusade at the Council of Clermont in 1095, he had to avoid Arles, where the deposed bishop was still in power. Between 1098 and 1099, however, Aicard probably relinquished his see to follow the Crusade. Ghibbelin appeared for the first time in Urban's papal bull releasing the citizens of Arles from the penalties incurred in 1080. Aicard was in the Holy Land from 1103 to 1105, where he joined Raymond
First Crusade between Rome and Constantinople in the years immediately before the crusade. In July 1095, Urban turned to his homeland of France to recruit men for the expedition. His travels there culminated in the ten day Council of Clermont, where on Tuesday 27 November he gave an impassioned sermon to a large audience of French nobles and clergy. There are five versions of the speech recorded by people who may have been at the council (Baldric of Dol, Guibert of Nogent, Robert the Monk, and Fulcher of Chartres) or who went on crusade (Fulcher and the anonymous author of the Gesta