The Muslim world finally appeared to unite. ibid.
The Muslim garrison was thrown into a state of utter confusion, and soon Antioch’s remaining gates were thrown open and the Crusaders poured in. In the half light of dawn a chaotic slaughter began. ibid.
The besiegers had become the besieged. ibid.
They overran the Holy City ... They unleashed a rampaging torrent of barbaric and indiscriminate slaughter. ibid.
The Crusaders were wading through their enemies’ blood. ibid.
In July 1192 Richard the Lionheart, king of England, valiant crusader knight, stood with his Holy Warriors preparing for a strike on Jerusalem. Thomas Asbridge, The Crusades 2/3: Clash of the Titans 2/3
Jihad literally means struggle, but in the Middle Ages this could represent a fight against internal impurity or a sacred physical struggle – a Holy War, and its message could be spread by poetry. ibid.
Saladin was quickly becoming the premier Muslim leader in the East ... He united the disparate Muslim factions into a coherent army. ibid.
The Christian army marching in the height of summer was being led into a waterless killing zone. ibid.
Jerusalem was back in Muslim hands. ibid.
In June 1191 Richard the Lionheart sailed down the coast of Palestine. ibid.
The Third Crusade had achieved a categorical victory. ibid.
During Richard’s long absence from home his brother John had been plotting to take control of England. ibid.
Against his better judgment the Lionheart began a second advance having effectively lost control of his Crusade. ibid.
The Lionheart failed to lead the third Crusade to victory. ibid.
Two centuries of religious war. Thomas Asbridge, The Crusades 3/3: Victory & Defeat
These Christian outposts were ruled by bickering warlords. ibid.
The power and wealth of the Hospitallers. This is a monument to rival anything in the Middle Ages ... Like their Templar brethren, they embraced the Crusading ideal. ibid.
Commercial contacts between East and West blossomed. ibid.
Louis was determined to bring Jerusalem back into the Christian fold. ibid.
Louis IX was the perfect Crusader king. ibid.
The Mongols and the Mamluks are the big players. ibid.
Nine hundred years ago the Christians of Western Europe launch the first Crusades. Vast armies marched on the Holy Land bent on the conquest of this sacred territory from its Muslim overlords … They would continue for two hundred years. The Crusades: A Timewatch Special, BBC 2016
Terry Jones [television series] shone a light on one such alternative perspective. ibid.
In his series The Normans historian Robert Bartlett described how this Crusade teetered on the edge of disaster. ibid.
Richard’s Crusade was at best a limited success. ibid.
Fight them! God will chastise them at your hands. And he will lay them low and give you victory over them. Koran 9:14
It is almost 100 years since Christian armies from Europe seized Jerusalem. Europe suffers in the grip of repression and poverty. Peasant and lord alike flee to the Holy Land in search of fortune and salvation. Kingdom of Heaven 2005 starring Orlando Bloom & Jeremy Irons & Eva Green & David Thewlis & Liam Neeson & Brendan Gleeson & Michael Sheen & Ghassan Massoud & Alexander Seddig & Khaled Nabawy et al, director Ridley Scott, caption
France 1184: I call it here. Now. ibid. Baron Godfrey
To kill an infidel is not murder. It is the path to heaven. ibid. Pilgrim Camp – Road to Messina
A kingdom of conscience. A Kingdom of Heaven. ibid. Neeson
I have lost my religion. ibid. hero
God wills it. ibid. Knights Templars
We are fighting for wealth and land. ibid. Irons
The King, Richard the Lionheart, went on to the Holy Land and crusaded for three years. ibid. caption
There is nothing intrinsic linking any religion with any act of violence. The crusades don't prove that Christianity was violent. The Inquisition doesn’t prove that Christianity tortures people. But that Christianity did torture people. Salman Rushdie
The Crusades – the most signal and most durable monument of human folly that has yet appeared in any age or nation. David Hume, The History of England I
Wonderful sights were to be seen. Some of our men (and this was more merciful) cut off the heads of their enemies; others shot them with arrows, so that they fell from the towers; others tortured them longer by casting them into the flames. Piles of heads, hands and feet were to be seen in the streets of the city. It was necessary to pick one's way over the bodies of men and horses. But these were small matters compared to what happened at the Temple of Solomon, a place where religious services are normally chanted ... in the temple and the porch of Solomon, men rode in blood up to their knees and bridle reins. Indeed it was a just and splendid judgement of God that this place should be filled with the blood of unbelievers since it had suffered so long from their blasphemies. Raymond D’Aguilers in Historia Francorum Qui Ceperunt Iherusalem 134
In Europe anti-Muslim sentiment simmered. By 1095 it reached the boiling point: Pope Urban II spent most of that year travelling through France imploring his feudal lords to unite in a campaign of bloodshed. Empires: Islam: Empire of Faith II: The Awakening, PBS 2000
Days of incomprehensible horror ... The Crusaders entered Jerusalem. ibid.
Saladin’s men set fire to the tall grass. And a strong wind carried the flames into the Christian encampment. ibid.
Three months later Saladin entered Jerusalem. ibid.
Remarkably, Saladin levels no retaliation against Christians or their holy places. ibid.
Saladin’s victory did not put an end to Western aspirations in the Near East. ibid.
Our crusade was so stupid, only an idealist could have invented it. The Seventh Seal 1957 starring Max von Sydow & Bengt Ekerot & Gunnar Bjornstrand & Nils Poppe & Bibi Andersson & Ake Fridell & Inga Gill & Erik Strandmark & Bertil Anderberg et al, director Ingmar Bergman, painter
Upon this seemingly peaceful desert two savage Crusades have been fought by Christians against Muslims. Palestine became a kingdom of the Cross. King Richard and the Crusaders aka Talisman 1954 starring Rex Harrison & Virginia Mayo & George Sanders & Laurence Harvey & Robert Douglas & Michael Pate & Paul Raymond & Lester Matthews & Antony Eustrel et al, director David Butler, opening commentary
Loyalty – a higher virtue than majesty sometimes. ibid. King to Scot
Out with your leeches and your brew! Jackals! Bloodsuckers! May the devils of Kurdistan seize you! ibid. King Richard upon sickbed
There is a divinity about a Plantagenet which must not be soiled by any oath of lower house or race. ibid. Richard
Is not one perfect diamond more warming than a thousand semi-precious fragments? ibid. Saracen doctor
Church-appointed knights terrorised their foes, amassed a huge fortune and may have indulged in forbidden rights. Who were these monks who killed for Christ? In Search of History s2e10: The Knights Templar, History 1997
In 1096 Pope Urban II sent an army of crusading knights from western Europe to capture the birthplace of Christianity from its Muslim overlords the Saracens. ibid.
Over 20,000 Templars died in battle during the crusades. ibid.
On the eastern frontier of the Christian world: faith, worship and blood, a new kind of conflict setting Muslim against Christian. A holy Land, a holy War. The Knights of Jerusalem’s temple. A new kind of soldier. Warriors for Christ. They were masters of the battlefields of the Middle East. Their very appearance made them icons of the Crusades. (Crusades & Knights Templar & Middle Ages) The Crusaders s1e1: The Knights Templar, History 2020
From the end of the 11th to the 15th century the Crusades rages across Europe and the Middle East. Perhaps 200,000 people answered the call of the Christian pope and left their homes behind. ibid.
For the next two centuries the Crusader kingdom thrived and survived. ibid.