The holy land, which is Jerusalem, is known as the centre of Christianity because it is where Jesus died and was buries. Jerusalem was taken over by the Muslims, and the Christians wanted it back because they wanted to be closer to Jesus and Christianity and stop the expansion of Muslim states. Western Europeans organised crusades, which means they were going to fight to get their land back, to regain Christianity in the middle east and to recapture original Christian territory. Only the first of the 8 crusades were successful. The crusades had a big impact on some cities, it effected trade routes, new were made because they needed a supply on food and other items, cities where these trade routes happened in also grew in size.
