Following the considerable contributions of certain south-Italian Normans to the success of the First Crusade (see chapter 8 in this volume), and the establishment of the Latin principalities in the Levant thereafter, individuals from this region seem to have played a fairly limited role in the history of the crusades and the Latin East. Whether this was, as John France has observed when viewing the First Crusade from a Norman point of view, the “last gasp of that great expansionist drive”, or, as Graham Loud has concluded from a different perspective, that “the crusade had no part in the Sicilian tradition”, it is hard to deny that the Kingdom of Sicily played a remarkably small part in the affairs of the Latin principalities through most of the twelfth century. What is commonly regarded as the moment of exception to this apparent apathy took place in 1174 when a Sicilian fleet attacked Alexandria (chapter 7 in this volume). Cast by historians as part of a broader crusading campaign, which was meant to coordinate with the forces of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem and a Shiite uprising in Cairo, this purported effort to capture Alexandria failed when the Sicilians found themselves unsupported. It seems, however, that there may be another way to interpret this episode, one which conforms more to the Sicilians’ modus operandi. Most of the details regarding this campaign, and the context of its planning, are found in Muslim sources, the majority of which can be traced back to the propagandistic concerns of Saladin, who was still defining his position as ruler of Egypt at this time. Saladin had an interest in seeing what might otherwise be characterised as a fairly traditional raid presented as a more serious attack, one undertaken in coordination with others who sought to remove him from power in Egypt. This allowed him to legitimise his position and portray himself as a champion of Sunni Islam.

When looking at the participants of the First Crusade and its successes, it is hard to overlook the contributions of Bohemond of Taranto, as well as those of his nephew, Tancred. In the decades following the crusade, men of similar southern-Italian Norman ancestry would fill out the baronage of the principality that Bohemond and Tancred established around Antioch; direct support from the rulers of southern Italy, however, was limited.