Crusade bull

A crusade bull or crusading bull (Latin: bulla cruciata) was a papal bull that granted privileges, including indulgences, to those who took part in the Crusades against infidels.[1][2] A bull is an official document issued by a pope and sealed with a leaden bulla. All crusade bulls were written in Latin. Those launching a new general crusade were encyclicals addressed to all the archbishops of the Latin Church.[3]

Bulls were not the only means by which popes organized crusades. Many types of papal letters without the bulla attached were issued to arrange, guide and direct crusading efforts. The bulls issued for the Reconquista ('reconquest') in the Iberian Peninsula evolved into something distinct. By the modern period, the "bull of the crusade" (Spanish: bula de la cruzada, Portuguese: bula da cruzada) was used by Spanish and Portuguese monarchs as a means of raising money through donations for various projects, not necessarily military. This system was finally abolished in 1966.[4]

  1. ^ M. W. Baldwin (2003), "Bulla cruciata" (PDF), The New Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. 2 (2nd ed.), Gale, p. 688.
  2. ^ Cite error: The named reference CE1 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  3. ^ Alfred J. Andrea (2003), "Bull, Papal", Encyclopedia of the Crusades, Greenwood Press, pp. 44–45, ISBN 0313316597.
  4. ^ Christopher T. Maier (2006), "Papal Letters", in Alan V. Murray (ed.), The Crusades: An Encyclopedia, vol. 3, ABC-CLIO, pp. 931–932.