The Chronicon of Archbishop William of Tyre is not only a source of unparalleled significance for historians of the Latin East, it is also one that offers an important window onto historical writing in twelfth-century Christendom. Comprising over 1,000 pages of Latin text in the modern critical edition, its twenty-three books span (roughly) the period of Latin Christian involvement in the Levant and Syria from the genesis of the First Crusade in 1095 through to the mid-1180s. The text reflects an extensive writing process, one that most historians argue began c. 1170 and lasted until the period immediately preceding the author's death c. 1184/86. Unsurprisingly for such a lengthy and important work, the Chronicon and its author have attracted widespread interest. However, except for Peter Edbury and John Rowe's 1988 study, scholars have rarely taken a broad-ranging approach to the Chronicon. Instead, recent work has largely focused on examining specific elements or themes of the text, with a growing interest in William's authorial strategies mirroring the emergence of literary approaches to crusade narratives. The Chronicon's first eight books, which account for over a third of the entire work and include the author's retelling of the First Crusade, have nevertheless either been ignored, largely because they are viewed as derivative and of little value in tracing William's authorial voice or ideological standpoints, or approached only to confirm arguments regarding related texts, especially Albert of Aachen's Historia Ierosolimitana and the so-called ‘Lost Lotharingian Chronicle’.

Some recent work has begun to redress this, but a close, careful and detailed analysis of William's account of the First Crusade remains necessary, especially given Edbury and Rowe's somewhat offhand – or at least not fully explored – concluding remark that ‘only in the story of the First Crusade did [William’s] narrative achieve a genuine homogeneity’. Such a study is vital to achieving a better understanding of the author and his text, for these sections offer the best opportunity to trace William's historical method by pinpointing his use and adaptation of other sources to craft his own version of events. But re-examining William's account of the First Crusade is also valuable because it will help to situate the Chronicon more firmly within the wider flourishing of history creation during the twelfth century and beyond, in both a crusading and non-crusading context.