The Third Crusade was one of the largest expeditions to the Holy Land conducted by Latin Christendom. In addition to the royal military households of Frederick Barbarossa, Philip Augustus, and Richard I, the retinues of magnates such as Henry II of Champagne, Hugh III of Burgundy, Philip of Alsace, and Robert Fitz-Pernel, and the military might of the Italian citystates, tens of thousands took the Cross and journeyed eastwards to join the siege of Acre. Failure threatened not only the loss of the kingdom of Jerusalem, but arguably the whole of Outremer.

Despite incurring losses so great that the crusader council decided that, should they take Jerusalem, they lacked the strength to hold it, the Third Crusade recovered sufficient territory that the kingdom of Jerusalem would endure for another century. In addition, the absence of the crusaders from their homes and estates, the raising of funds to cover their participation, and the logistical demands of their journeys to and from the Holy Land meant that the expedition had an impact across Christendom.

Whilst this examination of the official records and narratives from northwestern Europe has encountered the leading figures of the Third Crusade – kings, great lords, and ecclesiastical magnates – it has also revealed characters with neither high rank nor substantial influence. Most of the 583 protagonists that have emerged here could be described as important enough to enjoy a degree of independence but were still beholden to a higher secular or clerical authority. That is to say, they were typical of the majority of the noble elite of the late twelfth century. In this way, this research provides a clearer idea of the social norms of the noble elite than might have been possible through a study limited to the great men and women.

Ultimately, as Andrew Jotischky has argued, an individual crusader's motivations for taking the Cross and then journeying to the Holy Land are unknowable. However, the employment of Social Network Analysis to consider elite participants in the Third Crusade highlights a number of characteristics common amongst those who responded to the call to arms that followed the loss of the True Cross in 1187 and the subsequent fall of Jerusalem to Saladin.