Frivolity and reform in the Church: the Irish experience, 1066-1166

In mid November 1064, what was perhaps the most important pre-Crusade pilgrimage to Jerusalem left Bavaria under the leadership of Günther, bishop of Bamberg. The number of pilgrims, all unarmed, is stated as some seven thousand in the least incredible source text. The leading ecclesiastics came from all over the northern half of the Empire, from Utrecht to Regensburg. A substantial contingent hailed from the province of Mainz, led by Archbishop Siegfried. Only some two thousand are said to have returned the following year. Our earliest source is the chronicle kept at Mainz by the Gaelic inclusus, Moelbrigte / Marianus Scottus (d. 1082/3), who had lived at Mainz since 1069 and was certainly writing his chronicle by 1073/4.