Red Sea

The Red Sea separated the Crusader-ruled Holy Land from the Muslim heartlands of Egypt, the Hejaz and Yemen. For Latin rulers it was both a strategic bypass of Fatimid and Ayyubid territory and a tantalising window onto the spice and pilgrim traffic of the Indian Ocean.

The only Frankish foothold on the sea was the castle of Île de Graye on Pharaoh's Island in the Gulf of Aqaba, built by Baldwin I about 1116 to tax caravans and pilgrim shipping between Egypt and the Hejaz. It was lost to Saladin in 1170.

In 1182–83 Raynald of Châtillon launched his famous raid down the Red Sea: galleys were built at Kerak, dismantled, and carried overland across Oultrejordain to the Gulf of Aqaba. The fleet burned shipping at 'Aydhab and threatened the ports of Arabia before being destroyed by Saladin's Egyptian navy — the only medieval Crusader naval operation recorded in these waters.