None..
What were the political, social and economic causes of the Crusades?
What were some economic motivations for the Crusades?
None. Endeavoring to crusade was not only an extremely unprofitable venture for both crusader and kingdom alike, it very well brought many of these individuals and polities to near bankruptcy simply trying to amass a sizable amount of treasure for such an undertaking.
Crusading itself was an extremely time consuming and resource draining activity that demanded months, even years spent away from one’s own home to campaign against infidels thousands of miles away. Few, if any, crusaders had the necessary resources to pay for both their own responsibilities in their homeland and the requisite equipment and support needed for a crusade, bringing many to financial ruin.
The First Crusade was incredibly disorganized in its initial stages and financially ruinous to many of the individuals involved. Without the resources provided by monarchs on subsequent crusades, the princes were forced in many cases to sell many of their assets, raise taxes exponentially, and rely on charitable donations to fund their ventures. Even more telling was the fact that many crusaders returned to Europe upon completing their pilgrimage to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre rather than remain in the newly formed Outremer and carve out a financial legacy in the hopes of recouping lost treasure.
The Third Crusade saw one of the most organized and audacious attempts by any power involved, both crusader and state, as Henry the II amassed one of the largest war chests of any crusade up to that point in time, stripping his kingdom and holdings to the bone in order to amass cold, hard cash. Upon his death, his third son, Richard the Lionheart, would go even further, selling everything from offices to villages to tracts of land and quipping at one point that he would ‘sell the entirety of London’ if he could.
The Fourth Crusade. . .speaks for itself.
The Seventh Crusade, arguably the most organized and well funded of any crusading campaign, again proved immensely burdensome to the Kingdom of France and the nobility within it. King Louis IX was able to amass a sizable 1,500,000 livres tournois before he set out for the holy land and found himself spending a significant portion of it funding nobles and knights who had gone bankrupt while in Egypt. Considering the per annum income of Louis’ kingdom at the time, estimated at 250,000 livres tournois, the entire venture strained the Capetian realm to the breaking point.
Perhaps one of the most pervading myths of the crusades, quite confusingly so when one takes but a simple glance at context, is the notion of not only the crusaders as greedy and singularly minded individuals but also of immense material and financial rewards to be had by venturing to the holy land.
Far from a safe return on investment, crusading brought with it immense trials and tribulations—physically, financially, and perhaps most of all, spiritually—that made any venture to the holy land far more reliant on religious piety and devotion than naturalistic greed as a determining factor for participation.