It was Ernoul who investigated the almost-empty Templar castle of La Fève before news of the battle reached Balian.
The basis of these is a 13th-century Old French translation of the Latin chronicle of William of Tyre, who wrote in the Kingdom of Jerusalem in the mid- to late-12th century.
This French translation came to be known as the Estoire d'Eracles, because William of Tyre began his chronicle with the reign of Byzantine emperor Heraclius.
The text known as The Chronicle of Ernoul and Bernard the Treasurer, edited by L. de Mas Latrie in the 19th century, has a separate manuscript tradition.
Ernoul himself may have written only a small part, covering the years 1186 and 1187, in which Balian and the Ibelin family feature prominently.