By 1210, a leader had arisen to carry the Holy Crusade into the very heart of the heretical territories. Pope Innocent named Simon de Montfort to replace the heretic Raymond-Roger, who had been captured and would soon die in prison, as commander of the armies of the Catholic Church (Sumption, pg. 101). As with all other successful warlords throughout the Crusading period, Simon had surrounded himself with an experienced, loyal and courageous cadre of 200-300 knights, many of whom had fought by his side during the 4th Crusade (Oldenbourg, pg. 133). Vaux de Cerney described Simon as being tall, technically skilled at arms, handsome, elegant, a good tactician, unafraid of personal risk and a true soldier of Christ, though he also was not above blaming God for negligence when his troops suffered a setback (Oldenbourg, pg. 135). Not a humble man, Simon once said: "My work is the work of Christ and the entire Church is praying for me. We cannot be defeated", but his task would not be easy (Sumption, pg. 101).

In 1210 A.D., feuds, family vendettas and private wars were still the bane of any unified command and feudal structure. Lambert of Wattrelos noted that ten brothers had been killed in a single battle (Verbruggen, pg. 31). Keeping a tight rein on an army tested the best of commanders. Simon's Crusading force was no exception. At one point during the Crusade, Simon had to double the pay of his mercenary knights to prevent their desertion (Shannon, pg. 63). Individual combats were not unusual in an army made up of men from many lands, either. Privation, disease and boredom also thinned the ranks of the Crusaders as they marched south. Simon's adaptability to circumstances allowed him to successfully pursue the Crusade in the face of extremely poor conditions.

There still remained the mystical call of the 'Soldier of Christ', the concept so personified in the Parcifal legends, symbolizing an evolution by the 13th century of a true and loyal man, embodying the collective unconscious of Western Europe (Jung & Von-Franz, pp. 109-110). Aquinas had tried to use this concept as a motivating principle in his work. It is also what the story-tellers and troubadours held out as being the perfection of knighthood: the virtue and selflessness kindled by the Council of Clermont that recently had begun to die in the Levant.

Critical thinking, for instance, had not become a knightly art until the 12th century. Out of this mystical awareness grew a conception of the Grail castle, for which the literary figures of Parcival's father and brothers had died, as the futile quest for the Holy Land. The Grail itself came to symbolize man's soul and the winning of the soul was of major importance in the Western European consciousness. Parcifal's quest, written of by Wolfram von Eschenbach, circa 1200-1207, and by Chretien de Troyes, searched for the meaning and purpose to life which had inspired the First Crusade, but was then lost. The Albigensian Crusade, for many soldiers on both sides, became a chance to recapture their purpose for existence.

Some writers attempted to psychologically step away from the chivalrous, materialistic ego and move toward the spiritual: "When man is no longer satisfied with the materialistic view or with the effectiveness of working things, (he) goes beyond this and endows the concrete with symbolic meaning" (Jung and Von-Franz, pg. 222). Yet, the unbridled fury and violence of the war is striking in its cruelty towards fellow Christians, hardly an uplifting and rejuvenating experience. This "...dark spirit of nature, standing in opposition to the one-sidedness of Christianity, has assailed and crippled the Grail king" and led to the horrors of the Albigensian and subsequent genocidal Baltic Crusades (Jung and Von-Franz, pg. 211). Such was the temper and hatred of the times, always barely beneath the surface in even the noblest warrior.

As the Crusading forces moved into Languedoc, Simon's subjugation of the heretics was horrible. His tactics were intended to dissuade armed resistance, but instead resulted in attrocities on both sides as each strove to avenge their losses. After the capture of Bram in 1210, Vaux de Cernay described the aftermath as the garrison of 100 soldiers had their eyes gouged out and their lips and noses cut off; only one survivor was left with a good eye to lead the garrison to the next town in order to spread fear among the populace (Oldenbourg, pg. 136). At Biron, Simon captured a knight who had deserted to the enemy. He was stripped, tied to a horse and dragged before the army before he was hanged (Oldenbourg, pg. 138). Simon also participated in three recorded massacres of prisoners, reportedly experiencing 'intense joy' at watching the slaughter (Oldenbourg, pg. 138). At Lavaur in 1211, Simon hung the Baron of Montreal and eighty of his knights before burning 400 heretics on a huge pyre, the Chanson de la Croisade les Albigeois noting, "Never in the history of Christendom was so noble a baron hanged, and so many other knights beside him" (Oldenbourg, pg. 149). Work done in the name of God, no matter how heinous, escaped condemnation except from unofficial historians and troubadours.

It was not only Simon de Montfort's cruelty which turned the Albigensian Crusade into a no-quarter war of attrition, as both sides mutilated captured mercenaries, cutting off the hands and feet of foot soldiers while flaying noble knights to death (Oldenbourg, pg. 136). The excess of cruelty proved to much for some Crusaders who, being close to home, unlike their forefathers in the Holy Land, decided they had done enough to 'save their souls' and left (Sumption, pg. 105). Others took what riches and loot they could and after serving forty days, also went home, leaving the overextended Crusaders with only Simon's loyal household knights and a few hundred foot to guard the newly subjugated lands.

Peter II of Spain, desiring to build the southern foundation of a great empire, believed that if he could drive the Crusading invaders out of southern France, he would be viewed as a savior. Peter gave notice to all who would listen that the invading Crusaders actually were hindering his own war against the Moors in southern Spain, with Christian fighting Christian instead of helping him battle the infidel. In a curious change of heart, Pope Innocent III suspended the Albigensian Crusade during the winter months of 1213, reproving the disheartened Simon for attacking a handful of Peter's Spanish strongholds in southern France (Sumption, pg. 105).

The Albigensian Crusade Simon de Montfort vrs. King Peter of Spain: 1213 A.D.

Introduction
Simon de Montfort, the Flail of God
The Battle of Muret 1213 A.D.
Aftermath