First CrusadeThe First Crusade (1096–1099) was the first of a series of religious wars, or Crusades, initiated, supported and at times directed by the Latin Church in the medieval period. The objective was the recovery of the Holy Land from Islamic rule. While Jerusalem had been under Muslim rule for hundreds of years, by the 11th century the Seljuk takeover of the region threatened local Christian populations, pilgrimages from the West, and the Byzantine Empire itself.
Fourth CrusadeThe Fourth Crusade (1202–1204) was a Latin Christian armed expedition called by Pope Innocent III. The stated intent of the expedition was to recapture the Muslim-controlled city of Jerusalem, by first defeating the powerful Egyptian Ayyubid Sultanate. However, a sequence of economic and political events culminated in the Crusader army's 1202 siege of Zara and the 1204 sack of Constantinople, the capital of the Greek Christian-controlled Byzantine Empire, rather than Egypt as originally planned.
House of CapetThe House of Capet (Maison capétienne) ruled the Kingdom of France from 987 to 1328. It was the most senior line of the Capetian dynasty – itself a derivative dynasty from the Robertians. The direct line of the House of Capet came to an end in 1328, when the three sons of Philip IV (reigned 1285–1314) all failed to produce surviving male heirs to the French throne. With the death of Charles IV (reigned 1322–1328), the throne passed to the House of Valois, descended from a younger brother of Philip IV.
BéziersBéziers (bezje; Besièrs) is a subprefecture of the Hérault department in the Occitanie region of Southern France. Every August Béziers hosts the famous Feria de Béziers, which is centred on bullfighting. A million visitors are attracted to the five-day event. The town is located on a small bluff above the river Orb, about from the Mediterranean coast and southwest of Montpellier. At Béziers, the Canal du Midi passes over the river Orb by means of the Pont-canal de l'Orb, an aqueduct claimed to be the first of its kind.
Fifth CrusadeThe Fifth Crusade (1217–1221) was a campaign in a series of Crusades by Western Europeans to reacquire Jerusalem and the rest of the Holy Land by first conquering Egypt, ruled by the powerful Ayyubid sultanate, led by al-Adil, brother of Saladin. After the failure of the Fourth Crusade, Innocent III again called for a crusade, and began organizing Crusading armies led by Andrew II of Hungary and Leopold VI of Austria, soon to be joined by John of Brienne, titular King of Jerusalem.
ToulouseToulouse (tuːˈluːz , tuluz; Tolosa tuˈluzɔ) is the prefecture of the French department of Haute-Garonne and of the larger region of Occitania. The city is on the banks of the River Garonne, from the Mediterranean Sea, from the Atlantic Ocean and from Paris. It is the fourth-largest city in France after Paris, Marseille and Lyon, with 500,000 inhabitants within its municipal boundaries (2020 census); its metropolitan area has a population of 1,5 million inhabitants (2020 census).
AudeAude (od; ˈawðe) is a department in Southern France, located in the Occitanie region and named after the river Aude. The departmental council also calls it "Cathar Country" (French: Pays cathare) after a group of religious dissidents active in the 12th to 14th centuries. Its prefecture is Carcassonne and its subprefectures are Limoux and Narbonne. As of 2019, it had a population of 374,070. Aude is a frequent feminine French given name in Francophone countries, deriving initially from Aude or Oda, a wife of Bertrand, Duke of Aquitaine, and mother of Eudo, brother of Saint Hubertus.
SodomySodomy (ˈsɒdəmi), also called buggery in British English, generally refers to either anal sex (but occasionally also oral sex) between people, or any sexual activity between a human and an animal (bestiality). It may also mean any non-procreative sexual activity. Originally, the term sodomy, which is derived from the story of Sodom and Gomorrah in the Book of Genesis, was commonly restricted to homosexual anal sex. Sodomy laws in many countries criminalized the behavior.
History of ToulouseThe history of Toulouse, in Occitania, southern France, traces back to ancient times. After Roman rule, the city was ruled by the Visigoths and Merovingian and Carolingian Franks. Capital of the County of Toulouse during the Middle Ages, today it is the capital of the Midi-Pyrénées region. Archaeological evidence dates human settlement in Toulouse to the 8th century BC. Its location was advantageous; the Garonne River bends westward toward the Atlantic Ocean, and can be crossed easily.
