Middle Ages Egypt and suffering from a series of internal civil wars. The Byzantines also faced a revived Bulgaria, which in the late 12th and 13th centuries spread throughout the Balkans. The crusades were intended to seize Jerusalem from Muslim control. The First Crusade was proclaimed by Pope Urban II (pope 1088–99) at the Council of Clermont in 1095 in response to a request from the Byzantine Emperor Alexios I Komnenos (r. 1081–1118) for aid against further Muslim advances. Urban promised indulgence to anyone who took part. Tens of thousands of people from all levels of society mobilised across Europe and captured
Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Clermont Aquitaine by Pope John XXII, resulting in the creation of the diocese of Saint-Flour. In 1822, in the reorganization of French dioceses by Pope Pius VII, following the restoration of the Bourbon monarchy, the diocese of Clermont lost the Bourbonnais, on account of the erection of the diocese of Moulins. Since the reorganization in 2002 by Pope John Paul II, there are now four dioceses in the Province of Clermont: Clermont, Le Puy-en-Velay, Moulins, and Saint-Flour. The first Bishop of Clermont was Saint Austremonius (Stramonius). According to local tradition he was one of the seventy-two Disciples of Christ, by birth