These states in the Levant were the first examples of 'Europe overseas' and became known to historians by the French version of the phrase, Outremer. This, and later campaigns, established four crusader states in the Near East : the County of Edessa the Principality of Antioch the Kingdom of Jerusalem and the County of Tripoli. There was an enthusiastic response in Western Europe across all social strata. In particular the term refers to those states formed by the campaigns between and in the Eastern Mediterranean aimed at recovering the Holy Land from Islamic rule. Outremeror the Crusader stateswere feudal Christian states created by a series of religious wars initiated, supported and sometimes directed by the Latin Church in the Middle Ages.
