Kenneth Clark TV - Mankind: The Story of All of Us TV - Christianity: A History TV - Up the Chastity Belt 1972 - The Black Adder TV - Decoding the Past: The Templar Code TV - Simon Sebag Montefiore TV - Pope Urban II - Carole Hillenbrand - Reuven Amitai - Akbar Ahmed - Shimon Gibson - Tim Wallace-Murphy - Tariq Ali - The Dark Ages TV - Desmond Seward - Donald Queller - Ring of Power 2008 - Richard the Lionheart: Warriors TV - Jonathan Phillips - Robert Bartlett TV - Mystery Files: Saladin TV - Abdul Azzam - Nostradamus VI-80 - Thomas Asbridge & Timewatch TV - Koran 9:14 - Kingdom of Heaven 2005 - Salman Rushdie - David Hume - Raymond D’Aguilers - Empires: Islam TV - The Seventh Seal 1957 - King Richard and the Crusaders 1954 - In Search of History: The Knights Templar TV - The Crusaders TV -
The majority of people joined the Crusade in a spirit of pilgrimage. Kenneth Clark 2/13: Civilisation: The Great Thaw, BBC 1969
Thousands of Christians are executed and become celebrated as martyrs. Mankind: The Story of All of Us III, History 2012
A new Christian capital rises in the east of the empire: Constantinople. Today: Istanbul … the Church of the Holy Wisdom. ibid.
A world connected like never before. Christianity – the lasting legacy of the Roman Empire. ibid.
A Christian knight on a mission from God in the Holy Land waging war on Islam. Mankind: The Story of All of Us IV
The Pope calls on Christians to take up arms. ibid.
The Crusades will continue for two centuries and will cost more than a million lives. ibid.
At Clermont the Pope commanded the knights of Europe to capture what he believed were rightfully Christian cities and kill any Muslims that stood in their way. Rageh Omaar, Christianity s1e4: A History: Crusades, BBC 2010
What followed was the first major massacre of the Crusades. Hundreds perhaps thousands of Muslims were butchered here. From now on this kind of wholesale slaughter would be the calling card of Crusaders in many of the cities they conquered. ibid.
Most people will find it hard to believe that the Crusaders committed acts of cannibalism, but these acts were actually recorded by the Crusaders themselves. ibid.
But it was events in the twentieth century that transformed Saladin into a cult figure. The War against the Crusaders is now seen as Islam’s greatest victory against the West. ibid.
But yet in Europe I am struck by the opposite: by the absence of history and the knowledge of this chapter of Christian history. ibid.
Oh I’m so bored. Oh sod this for a lark. I’m going on a crusade. Up the Chastity Belt 1972 starring Frankie Howerd & Graham Crowden & Bill Fraser & Roy Hudd & Hugh Paddick & Anna Quayle & Fred Emney & David King & Lance Percival & Nora Swinburne & Godfrey Winn et al, director Bob Kellett, Frankie as King Richard
In 1486, the second year of Richard IV’s historic reign and also the year in which the egg replaced the worm as the lowest form of currency, King Richard departed England on a Crusade against the Turks. The Black Adder: Born to Be King, BBC 1983
Two warriors came to prominence. Two warlords who would use Jihad as their rallying cry. Nur-ad-Din was a powerful leader who in 1146 took control of parts of what are now Syria and Jordan. A deeply religious man he immersed himself in the study of the Koran ... Nurd-ad-Din’s interpretation of Jihad resonated with his subjects who were eager to defeat the Europeans ... His deputy: a young warrior who was also a devout student of the Koran: his name was Saladin ... The reins of power were taken by Saladin who began immediately to plan an assault on Jerusalem ... The night before the assault the Muslims set the grass around the Crusader camp aflame. By dawn the Crusaders were enveloped in choking black smoke. As the sun rose over the battlefield the Islamic army attacked. After half a day of fierce battle in the searing heat the Crusader army lay devastated. This was a turning point in the history of the Crusades. Emboldened by his victory Saladin turned his attention to claiming Jerusalem. Decoding the Past: The Koran, History 2006
Richard’s early encounter with Saladin’s forces resulted in decisive victories for the Christians. But taking Jerusalem proved much more difficult. Saladin’s armies were strong, and the open ground around the walled city made it difficult to mount an effective attack. The Muslims and the Christians were at a stalemate. On the 2nd September 1892 both sides agreed to a truce. ibid.
The Templar Army began its gruesome desert march towards Tiberius without water or shelter. Weak and disorientated. That evening was when Saladin’s forces closed in to surround them. In the attack that followed ... it was the worst single military disaster in the Holy Land. The surviving Christian knights were sold into slavery. Decoding the Past: The Templar Code, History 2007
Saladin took the city a few months later. The Christians fought back under Richard the Lionheart, retaking the city in 1229. But held it only briefly. In 1244 the Turks recaptured Jerusalem, effectively bringing an end to Christian rule. ibid.
And began their vicious slaughter of the Muslim faithful, whether citizens or soldiers. The battle raged for hours. Crusaders killed everyone they could find in the streets and the alleyways. Simon Sebag Montefiore, Jerusalem: The Making of a Holy City 2/3: Invasion, Invasion, Invasion, BBC 2011
Some Muslims leapt to their deaths. ibid.
The toll was probably between ten and thirty thousand dead. ibid.
Islam resolved to win back the Holy City. And the man who would launch this new Holy War was Saladin. ibid.
For, as the most of you have heard, the Turks and Arabs have attacked them and have conquered the territory of Romania [the Greek empire] as far west as the shore of the Mediterranean and the Hellespont, which is called the Arm of St George. They have occupied more and more of the lands of those Christians, and have overcome them in seven battles. They have killed and captured many, and have destroyed the churches and devastated the empire. If you permit them to continue thus for a while with impurity, the faithful of God will be much more widely attacked by them. On this account I, or rather the Lord, beseech you as Christ's heralds to publish this everywhere and to persuade all people of whatever rank, foot-soldiers and knights, poor and rich, to carry aid promptly to those Christians and to destroy that vile race from the lands of our friends. I say this to those who are present, it meant also for those who are absent. Moreover, Christ commands it.
All who die by the way, whether by land or by sea, or in battle against the pagans, shall have immediate remission of sins. Pope Urban II, speech at Council of Clermont, Fulcher of Chartres’ version
From the confines of Jerusalem and the city of Constantinople a horrible tale has gone forth and very frequently has been brought to our ears, namely, that a race from the kingdom of the Persians, an accursed race, a race utterly alienated from God, a generation forsooth which has not directed its heart and has not entrusted its spirit to God, has invaded the lands of those Christians and has depopulated them by the sword, pillage and fire; it has led away a part of the captives into its own country, and a part it has destroyed by cruel tortures; it has either entirely destroyed the churches of God or appropriated them for the rites of its own religion. They destroy the altars, after having defiled them with their uncleanness. They circumcise the Christians, and the blood of the circumcision they either spread upon the altars or pour into the vases of the baptismal font. When they wish to torture people by a base death, they perforate their navels, and dragging forth the extremity of the intestines, bind it to a stake; then with flogging they lead the victim around until the viscera having gushed forth the victim falls prostrate upon the ground. Others they bind to a post and pierce with arrows. Others they compel to extend their necks and then, attacking them with naked swords, attempt to cut through the neck with a single blow. What shall I say of the abominable rape of the women? To speak of it is worse than to be silent. The kingdom of the Greeks is now dismembered by them and deprived of territory so vast in extent that it can not be traversed in a march of two months. On whom therefore is the labour of avenging these wrongs and of recovering this territory incumbent, if not upon you? ibid. Robert the Monk’s version
We have heard, most beloved brethren, and you have heard what we cannot recount without deep sorrow how, with great hurt and dire sufferings our Christian brothers, members in Christ, are scourged, oppressed, and injured in Jerusalem, in Antioch, and the other cities of the East. Your own blood brothers, your companions, your associates (for you are sons of the same Christ and the same Church) are either subjected in their inherited homes to other masters, or are driven from them, or they come as beggars among us; or, which is far worse, they are flogged and exiled as slaves for sale in their own land. Christian blood, redeemed by the blood of Christ, has been shed, and Christian flesh, akin to the flesh of Christ, has been subjected to unspeakable degradation and servitude. Everywhere in those cities there is sorrow, everywhere misery, everywhere groaning (I say it with a sigh). ibid. Balderic of Dol’s version
Their unspeakable cruelty was carried on even to the point of giving them scammony to drink until they vomited, or even burst their bowels, because they thought the wretches had swallowed gold or silver; or, horrible to say, they cut their bowels open with a sword and, spreading out the folds of the intestines, with frightful mutilation disclosed whatever nature held there in secret. Remember, I pray, the thousands who have perished vile deaths, and strive for the holy places from which the beginnings of your faith have come. Before you engage in His battles, believe without question that Christ will be your standard-bearer and inseparable forerunner. ibid. Guibert de Nogent’s version