Winter – Egyptian forces led by Saladin invaded Palestine and besiege Darum on the Mediterranean coast. Its defenses are weak, and though Saladin has no siege engines with him, the fall seems imminent. King Amalric I withdraws his Templar garrison from Gaza, to assist him in defending Darum. Saladin raises the siege and marches on Gaza, where he captures the lower town (despite the stiff resistance ordered by Lord Miles of Plancy), and massacres the inhabitants. However, the citadel is too strong for Saladin, and he is forced to retreat to Egypt.[1]
Saladin sends an Egyptian squadron up the Gulf of Aqaba, which captures the Crusader outpost of Aila, at the head of the Gulf.[2]
July 22 – Henry II and Thomas Becket meet near Fréteval, France, where they come to an agreement to end their differences. This results in Becket's partial restoration.
December 1 – Becket controversy: Henry II sends word that his conflict with Thomas Becket is at an end, and his lands will be restored. Becket returns to England, landing at Sandwich.
December 29 – Thomas Becket is assassinated by four knights (who believe themselves to be carrying out Henry II's wishes) in Canterbury Cathedral, after his refusal to be arrested for breaking his agreement with Henry II.[4]
This is the earliest date for the making of Cheddar Cheese in Somerset (this is according to a pipe roll of Henry II, who purchases 10,240 lb of Cheddar at a farthing per pound).
March 12 – Emperor Manuel I (Komnenos) orders the arrest of all Venetians in his empire, and seizes their ships and goods. In September, Doge Vitale II Michiel leads a Venetian fleet (120 ships) against the Byzantines, conquering the cities of Trogir and Dubrovnik. But the plague takes a heavy toll among the fleet's crewmen; half the ships have to be burned to keep them from falling into enemy hands. A plague also breaks out in Venice, when the remaining ships return.
July – King Henry II decides to lead a military expedition to Ireland and summons Richard de Clare (Strongbow) to join forces. In September, Richard travels to England and promises his loyalty to Henry. He is granted Leinster as a fiefdom and is honored with the post of "royal constable in Ireland". The army is assembled at Pembroke – several siege towers are shipped over, should Henry need to assault the Norman-held towns (or others such as Cork and Limerick).[10]
October 17 – Henry II invades Ireland and lands with a large army of at least 500 mounted knights, and 4,000 men and archers at Waterford. Henry commandeers merchant ships as part of his invasion.[11] He claims the ports of Dublin, Waterford, and Wexford, and promises the Irish chieftains protection if they will acknowledge him as their overlord. Henry is recognized as "Lord of Ireland", traders are invited to Dublin where an English colony is set up.[11]
Ascall mac Ragnaill (or Torcaill), last Norse–Gaelic king of Dublin, is captured while trying to retake Dublin from the English forces under Richard de Clare, perhaps in company with Sweyn Asleifsson, and is beheaded. Before the end of the year, Richard relinquishes possession of the city to Henry II, who converts it into an English royal town.
March 10 – King Amalric I of Jerusalem departs with a large staff for Constantinople. At Callipolis he is met by his father-in-law, John Doukas Komnenos, military governor (doux) of Cyprus. Amalric enters the Byzantine capital and is welcomed by Manuel I. In June, a treaty is signed, Amalric recognizes Manuel's suzerainty over Jerusalem.[12]
September 25 – Saladin leads an Egyptian army to take part in a joint attack on the Crusader castles Kerak and Montréal, south of the Dead Sea. In November, Saladin withdraws his forces to Cairo to suppress a coup.
Yesugei (Baghatur), Mongol chieftain, arranges a marriage between his 9-year-old son Temujin (Genghis Khan) and the daughter of the chief of a nearby clan, Börte. He is poisoned by the Tatars while sharing a meal during the wedding.[13]
April–May – Béla III returns to Hungary – where he is acclaimed king by the Hungarian nobility, after the death (possibly poison) of his elder brother Stephen III, on March 4.
May 28 – Doge Vitale II Michiel, accused at a General Assembly at the Ducal Palace, for the destruction of the Venetian fleet, is stabbed to death by an angry mob at Venice.
A Muslim rebellion is quelled at Prades in Catalonia; this event marks the end of the pacification of the lands recently conquered by Count Ramon Berenguer IV (the Saint).[15]
King Henry II and Humbert III (the Blessed), agree to wed their respective heirs, John and Alicia. The alliance never occurs because Henry's elder heir, Henry the Young King, becomes jealous over the castles in the realm which Henry has promised to the couple. He stages a rebellion which will take Henry two years to put down. By that time, Alicia has died.[16]
Summer – Emir Nur al-Din begins a two year war against the Danishmends. He creates a buffer zone between the Syrian realm and Egypt. Meanwhile, he releases Count Raymond of Tripoli for the sum of 80,000 dinars.
Winter – The Nubians are engaged in a series of skirmishes along the frontier in Upper Egypt. A force of Kurdish troops under Turan-Shah, a brother of Saladin, attack the Nubians. He installs a garrison in Qasr Ibrim.[18]
King Canute I (Knut Eriksson) extends his rule after the death of co-ruler Kol – which includes also Östergötland. He becomes the unopposed sole-ruler of Sweden. Canute is supported by Earl Birger Brosa.
Abu Yaqub Yusuf, caliph of the Almohad Caliphate, re-populates the western Andalusian city of Beja. But it is rapidly abandoned, a sign of the quick demographic weakening of the Muslims in the peninsula.[20]
December 8 – The Treaty of Falaise: Captured by the English, William I is forced to sign a peace agreement. The treaty makes Scotland a feudal possession of England, William and his nobles swear allegiance to Henry II. He must hand over several castles to Henry in return for his freedom.[23]
Summer – French forces under King Louis VII, supported by Henry the Young King and Philip of Alsace, encircle Rouen. The city holds out against the war engines long enough for Henry II to arrive in the middle of August to stage a rescue. The besiegers are fearful that Henry will invade France and the siege is lifted.
November 23 – Saladin arrives at Damascus and spends the night at his father's old house, until the gates of the Citadel of Damascus, are opened to him, after a brief siege by his brother Tughtakin ibn Ayyub.[29]
July 25 – The Sicilian fleet (some 250 ships) under Admiral Tancred launches a failed attack against Alexandria. But he is deprived of support and forced to sail away after a seven-day blockade on August 1.[30]
Saladin sends his brother Turan-Shah with an army and supporting fleet to conquer Yemen. This to consolidate Muslim control over the Red Sea while protecting the pilgrimage route from Egypt to Mecca.[31]
Eleanor of Aquitaine is held under house arrest at Old Sarum Castle in Wiltshire. She is kept in comfort there – fine clothes for her are dispatched regularly from London.[35]
Under the admirals of the clan Banu Mardanish, an Almohad fleet suffers a large defeat at the hand of the Portuguese, as they are trying to re-conquer Lisbon.[36]
May 22 – A group of Isma'ili Assassins gains access into Saladin's camp and attempts to kill him during the siege of Aleppo. But his bodyguard saves his life, the others are slain while trying to escape.[37]
The Chinese court establishes several government-paper money factories in the cities of Chengdu, Hangzhou and Huizhou. In Hangzhou alone a daily workforce of more than 1,000 men is employed.[38]
Summer – Emperor Manuel I (Komnenos) assembles a Byzantine expeditionary force, and marches towards Iconium, the Seljuk capital. Meanwhile, hordes of Seljuk Turks destroy crops and poison water supplies, to make Manuel's march more difficult, and harass the Byzantine army, in order to force it into the Meander Valley. Kilij Arslan II, ruler of the Sultanate of Rum, hears of the expedition, and sends envoys to ask for peace.[40]
September 17 – Battle of Myriokephalon: The Seljuk Turks defeat the Byzantine forces led by Manuel I, who are ambushed when moving through a narrow mountain pass near Lake Beyşehir. The Byzantines are dispersed and surrounded. They suffer heavy casualties and their siege equipment is destroyed. Manuel flees in panic and is forced to sign a peace treaty with Kilij Arslan II.[41]
Al-Adil I, Ayyubid governor of Egypt, suppresses a revolt by the Christian Copts in the city of Qift, hanging nearly 3,000 of them on the trees near the city.
June 30 – Emperor Frederick I (Barbarossa) is crowned King of Burgundy at Arles. He will repeat the ceremony in 1186. Returning to Germany, he begins proceedings against Henry III (the Lion), duke of Saxony, who has been charged by Saxon noblemen with breaking the king's peace.
April 10 – A Crusader army led by King Baldwin IV of Jerusalem ("the Leper") is ambushed by Muslim forces in a narrow valley in the forest of Banyas. Baldwin is only able to extricate his forces owing to the heroism of Humphrey II, lord of Toron, who holds up the Muslims with his bodyguard till Baldwin and his army escape. Humphrey suffers mortal wounds and dies on April 22.[71] He is succeeded by his 13-year-old grandson Humphrey IV.
August 30 – Siege of Jacob's Ford: Muslim forces led by Saladin conquer and destroy the unfinished Castle of Chastellet at Jacob's Ford, killing 80 knights and taking 700 civilians captive.[73]
June 24 – Henry the Lion, duke of Saxony, is put under the ban of the empire when he refuses to appear before Emperor Frederick I (Barbarossa) to answer charges of misgovernment.[74]
Mieszko III (the Old), duke of Poland, travels to Germany and ask Frederick I to offer help in his restoration of the Polish throne. But Frederick demands a payment of 10,000 silver.
Summer – Richard de Luci (or Lucy), High Sheriff of Essex, resigns his judicial office. He enters Lesnes Abbey (near London) that he founded in Kent, as penance for his part in the events leading to the murder of Thomas Becket (see 1170). Richard dies there on July 14.
September 17 – A large offensive, by the Almohad army led by Yusuf I in southern Portugal, aims at the reconquest of the Alentejo.[76] Further north, an Almohad fleet sails to attack Lisbon, but is repelled by the Portuguese, near the Cape Espichel.[76] The Portuguese fleet later manages to enter in the harbour of Ceuta, and destroy a number of Muslim ships. It is the beginning of a four-year naval conflict between the Almohads and Portuguese.
Taira no Kiyomori, Japanese military leader, confines the former Emperor Go-Shirakawa to his quarters after discovering that he has tried to confiscate the estates of Kiyomori's deceased children.
March – Third Council of the Lateran: The Council condemns Waldensians and Cathars as heretics. It further institutes a reformation of clerical life and regulates that in order to prevent future schisms, the pope must receive 2⁄3 of the cardinals' votes to be elected.
A synod of thirty-three Armenian bishops in Hromkla discusses the conditions for union with the Byzantine Church and sends a profession of faith to emperor Manuel I Komnenos who dies before receiving it.[77]
^Hywell Williams (2005). Cassell's Chronology of World History, p. 126. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson. ISBN0-304-35730-8.
^McGrank, Lawrence (1981). "Norman crusaders and the Catalan reconquest: Robert Burdet and the principality of Tarragona 1129-55". journal of Medieval History. 7 (1): 67–82. doi:10.1016/0304-4181(81)90036-1.
^Martin, Francis Xavier (2008). "Chapter 2: Diarmaid mac Murchadha and the coming of the Anglo-Normans". In Art Cosgrove (ed.). A New History of Ireland, Volume II: Medieval Ireland 1169–1534. Oxford University Press. p. 87.
^ abWarren, W. L. (1961). King John. University of California Press. pp. 34, 121.
^Steven Runciman (1952). A History of The Crusades. Vol II: The Kingdom of Jerusalem, pp. 318–319. ISBN978-0-241-29876-3.
^Cleaves, Francis Woodman (1982). The Secret History of the Mongols, p. 17. Harvard-Yenching Institute. ISBN978-0-674-79670-6.
^Turner, Ralph; Heiser, Richard (2013). The Reign of Richard Lionheart: ruler of the Angevin empire, 1189-99. London: Routledge: Taylor and Francis, p. 57. ISBN978-1-317-8904-23.
^McGrank, Lawrence (1981). "Norman crusaders and the Catalan reconquest: Robert Burdet and the Principality of Tarragona 1129-55". Journal of Medieval History. 7 (1): 67–82. doi:10.1016/0304-4181(81)90036-1.
^King John by Warren. Published by the University of California Press in 1961. p. 29
^Kingsford, Charles Lethbridge (1892). "Lacy, Hugh de (d. 1186)". In Lee, Sidney (ed.). Dictionary of National Biography, p. 31. London: Smith, Elder & Co.
^Picard, Christophe (2000). Le Portugal musulman (VIIIe-XIIIe siècle): L'Occident d'al-Andalus sous domination islamique. Paris: Maisonneuve & Larose. p. 110. ISBN2-7068-1398-9.
^Beeler, John (1971). Warfare in Feudal Europe, 730–1200, pp 104–105. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. ISBN0-8014-9120-7.
^Johrendt, Jochen (2012). "The Empire and the Schism". In Duggan, Anne J.; Clarke, Peter D. (eds.). Pope Alexander III (1159–81): The Art of Survival. Routledge. p. 122. ISBN9781317078371.
^Estonian Theological Society in Exile (April 1956). "Charisteria Iohanni Kõpp octogenario oblata. 304 pp. Stockholm, 1954. $5.00. (Papers of the Estonian Theological Society in Exile, No. 7.) (May be obtained from the Bookstore, Chicago Lutheran Theological Seminary, Maywood, Ill.)". Theology Today. 13 (1): 129. doi:10.1177/004057365601300124. ISSN0040-5736. S2CID220990258.
^Unité mixte de recherche 5648--Histoire et archéologie des mondes chrétiens et musulmans médiévaux. Pays d'Islam et monde latin, Xe-XIIIe siècle: textes et documents. Lyon: Presses Universitaires de Lyon.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
^Picard C. (1997). La mer et les musulmans d'Occident au Moyen Age. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, p. 78.