The Crusades: A Short Story

by Jonathan Riley-Smith

A comprehensive history of the Crusades: an account of the theology of violence behind the Crusades, the major Crusades, the experience of crusading, and the crusaders themselves.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Medieval, Medieval History, Religion, European History, Christianity

306 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1987

About the author

Jonathan Simon Christopher Riley-Smith, Dixie Professor of Ecclesiastical History at the University of Cambridge, was educated at Eton College and Trinity College Cambridge. He received his BA (1960), MA (1964), PhD (1964) and LittD (2001) from Cambridge.

From 1964–1972 Dr. Riley-Smith taught in the Department of Medieval History at the Unversity of St Andrews, first as assistant lecturer, until 1966, then as lecturer. From 1972 until 1978, he served on the history faculty at the University of Cambridge. He was professor of history at the University of London from 1978 until 1994. Since 1994, Professor Riley-Smith has served on the faculties of history and divinity at the University of Cambridge. He is a fellow of Emmanuel College, Cambridge. From 1997 to 1999 he was chair of the faculty of history.

He was a founder member (1980), acting secretary (1980–1982) and president (1987–1995) of the Society for the Study of the Crusades and the Latin East. Other positions he has held include Knight of Grace and Devotion, Sovereign Military Order of Malta, Officer of Merit, Order Pro Merito Melitens, and Knight of Justice, Most Venerable Order of St John.

Reviews

[Diabolical Duckling · Rating 3 out of 5]

I feel guilty rating this book so low because it is such an authoritative piece of scholarship. Jonathan Riley-Smith deserves props for being able to condense and catalog such a nuanced period of history. However, Riley-Smith falls into the trap of many “academic” writers that I end up reading for my classes: the trap of verbosity. This book is a wonderful chronicle of history, and because I am a student of history, I read it with some enthusiasm. However, this book is not at all accessible to the layman who may just want to learn a bit about the crusades, as the writing style is excessively verbose and dense. Hence the 3 stars instead of 4. But who am I to judge? If I had to write a whole ass book about religious fanatics shanking each other for three centuries I’d be depressed and tired too. Ultimately, I give the author props for tackling this monumental period of history and for the in-depth historical analysis of social trends and events surrounding the crusading past.

This book is about the Crusading years, AKA a period where some of the worst fuckery humanity had to offer was on full display. Seriously folks. Read ANY in-depth history of the crusades and you’ll suddenly understand why every 13-year old atheist is so salty about religion. For those who the American School system failed; the Crusades were a roughly 3 century long pissing contest between Christian Europe and the Islamic Middle East. It can be argued (at least from the facts presented in this book) that the pissing contest was unfairly initiated by Christian Europe. Seriously. While the Islamic rulers of the Holy Land were not perfect, they allowed Christians and Jews to worship freely, extracting higher taxes from those who did not practice the Islamic faith. The Islamic and non-Islamic residents of the Levant were chilling, minding their own business in a relatively multiethnic society when a Pope decided to get greedy.

Since when are Popes not greedy? Never. Never in the history of ever. But anyways, a Pope (probably a Clement, or a Pius, I’d try to remember but there are seriously too damn many) wakes up after a night of wine and Roman tramps with a splendid idea. The Christian Kings of Europe should retake the Holy Land, which is currently in the possession of those devil-worshipping Muslims! Leveraging his spiritual power, as well as some classic ole racist and xenophobic appeal, the Pope manages to get a scrappy coalition of European kings to take the cross and invade the Middle East because JESUS! The kings proceed to launch a successful first crusade, retaking the holy land and establishing a colony in Jerusalem. They manage to drive out most of the Muslims, who were completely unprepared militarily for the Christian assault because who the fuck invades a whole ass country on short notice? Never underestimate the power of the Holy Spirit, apparently. The Christians reign in peace and holy harmony in Jerusalem for around a century before everything goes to shit.

Seriously, it is both tragic and humorous how quickly the entire Crusading venture goes to shit after Jerusalem falls. After a long line of European kings of the Levant (all named Baldwin for some reason) finally die off, another pissing contest emerges between the daughters of some blokes related to the last Baldwin. Saladin, a Muslim ruler, takes advantage of the disarray and kicks the European squatters off his lawn, so to speak. Under militant ideas of Islam, Saladin & Co drive out the invaders, causing mass panic among the Christians. Unable to retake the Holy Land, the European Crusader force decides to turn on each other for the sake of gold and plunder. Some of the unfortunate targets of the Crusader rage include but are not limited to:

- The Moors (who were kicked out of Spain)
- Lithuanians who just wanted to worship tree spirits in peace.
- Egyptians in general
- Jewish people who were massacred by the Europeans because of anti-Semitic bullshit.
- The Greek Orthodox Byzantine Empire, which was ruled by Christians, but by the wrong kind of Christians.
- A bunch of old ladies in France who were heretics apparently?
- Italian merchant families who were just trying to make money, but the Pope had them on his shitlist.
- Children who made their own crusade effort for Piety Points but were tricked and sold into slavery. (probably to perverts)

Seriously folks, the Crusades has it all. If you want some real Game of Thrones style historical shit, just take one look at this time period. There’s greedy Popes. Arrogant Christian and Muslim rulers. Sneaky Queens. Thuggish Knights. A shitton of peasants who died for no reason. Dead Saints. Bones and creepy relics. EVERYTHING. If you want to be entertained by some of the worst antics humanity has to offer, look no further. This book has opened my eyes to this weird and wild time in history, and I am determined to read more detailed and engaging books about this time period.

[John Roberson · Rating 5 out of 5]

This guy literally wrote the book on modern Crusades scholarship. This is no mere revisionist apology, but he upturns the popular conception of the Crusades: Could they have had to do with something more than greed and hate, West plundering East, violent religionists in need of enlightened humanism? Read this book and learn more about the Crusades than you thought there was to know. Read this book and cringe the next time you see a movie set during the Crusades.

[Elizabeth Morgan · Rating 2 out of 5]

Heavy on the purple prose and hyperbole, but light on the details. The details thing is to be expected in book covering a thousand years or so. The love-letter to Richard I of England was pretty spectacular, though. You could do worse for Baby's First Crusade Overview.

Zero excuses for the lack of referencing, though, even on directly quoted material. Be an academic textbook, or be a short introduction. Don't try and fail at both.

[Ietrio · Rating 1 out of 5]

I can't wait to see what fantastic discoveries has this paper pusher made, as it needed three editions!

[Dietrich · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Crusades: A History, by Jonathan Riley-Smith, is a thoughtful, well-articulated, broadly conceived and highly informative account of the crusading movement. The author also provides the reader with a perspective on many of the basic historiographical issues/controversies concerning the crusades, and includes a useful, well-organized bibliography. This is quite a lot to pack into one little book.

As a historian of the crusades, Riley-Smith writes as a self-described pluralist. Pluralists, unlike their interpretive rivals, the traditionalists, do not define the crusades in terms of hostility to Islam. As their name indicates, the pluralists view the crusades as legitimately comprising a wide variety of activities. These certainly included struggles against Islam in various locations (including, though it is often forgotten, Spain), but also involved struggles against heretics, papal political opponents, and pagans in the North. As Riley-Smith puts it, "A crusade was fought against those perceived to be the external or internal foes of Christendom for the recovery of Christian property or in defence of the Church or Christian people." (p.xxxi)

Though Riley-Smith interprets crusading broadly, he still distinguishes it from other kinds of Christian holy warfare. "Every crusader took a vow, which he or she was committed to fulfill as a penance; that is an act, often of self-punishment, which constituted an attempt to repay the debt owed to God on account of sin. It was for this reason that each was also granted an indulgence. This privilege, fully developed from c. 1200, and the guarantee of remission of sins which preceded it, distinguished crusading from most other forms of Christian holy war." (p.xxx) Riley-Smith thinks that the crusading vow was not mere formality. Crusading really was largely a penitential activity in its early days, says Riley-Smith, and even later on the movement never ceased to be animated to a significant extent by a concern for self-sanctification. In a time of widespread and deepening piety, crusading allowed laymen their own sort of religious vocation, and the energy unleashed by the crusades is impossible to explain without taking seriously the religious/ideological assumptions and preoccupations of medieval Europe. In fact, Riley-Smith thinks pluralists, by casting their interpretive nets far and wide, have done a great service to historical understanding by uncovering much evidence that supports an ideological interpretation of crusading motivations at the expense of materialistic interpretations. These materialistic explanations were, to Riley-Smith, never particularly strong to begin with.

I can see how one might view Riley-Smith's interpretive stance with some skepticism. His pluralism validates as legitimate crusades many activities that others have viewed as corruptions and perversions of the crusading phenomenon. And his stress on self-sanctification as a crusading motivation might appear to mask other motives. However, I did not get the sense when reading this book that Riley-Smith is attempting to whitewash the crusades. Riley-Smith is not promoting an agenda; his book is intended as an act of recovery. He insists on trying to understand crusaders as they understood themselves. In a united, Catholic Christendom, a pluralistic understanding of the crusades, as articulated by the popes, made much sense. Heretics were just as big a threat to Christendom as were Muslims. Political opponents of papal power threatened the right ordering of society. And so on. One need not admire particular manifestations of crusading pluralism to recognize that these manifestations were largely the work of a society trying to live up to its self-understanding. Also, Riley-Smith does a credible job of making clear the penitential dimension of crusading. He not only alludes to and makes use of copious amounts of written evidence, he also makes strong arguments against understanding the appeal of the crusades as motivated by colonial designs, an impulse to pillage, or the convenient alleviation of surplus population. Idealism seems to have been the real motive force. In addition, Riley-Smith illuminates how the ideological motivations of medieval people have often been buried under layers of modern historiographical assumptions. In general, Riley-Smith seems to stand on solid interpretive ground, though I certainly would like to read other accounts of the crusades so as to more fully understand differing perspectives as well.

A noteworthy feature of this book is that it traces different contributions to the crusading movement. I will mention some highlights. The earlier "peace of God" movement helped make clear to churchmen the potential value of channeling military power to serve Christ's ends. The notion that violence could be a spiritually purifying, penitential activity seems to have been first articulated by Gregory VII in his struggle with the German Emperor, though this notion met with plenty of skepticism. Urban II, who called for the first crusade, made the all-important link between purifying violence and a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. This link enabled the crusades by making the idea of penitential violence broadly acceptable. Innocent III proved more important than anyone with the exception of Urban II for developing the crusading movement. With Innocent, the intellectual articulations of crusading reached maturity. In particular, Innocent guaranteed remission of sins through an indulgence. Although this position already existed in the writings of others like Bernard of Clairvaux, Innocent gave it definitive formulation. This position was different than an earlier view, as exemplified by Urban II, which did not guarantee that the penitential nature of crusading would result in the full remission of sins in particular instances. Innocent's position proved extraordinarily popular. Innocent also was the first Pope to exploit redemptions (which would in later times lead to real problems for the church), the first to build up a complex system for preaching crusades, the first to tax the church for crusades, and the first to launch a large-scale crusade against heretics.

Other general contributions to crusading included the creation of military orders and military order states, the notion of a permanent crusade, made real in the Baltic region through the Teutonic Knights, and the creation of passagium particulare and league crusading. The passagium particulare was a crusade involving a limited but important tactical strike. League crusading involved alliances of independent Christian powers. Riley-Smith points out that those in the military orders were not technically crusaders, nor were the league crusades technically crusades, but that it is impossible to discuss the crusading movement without talking about such phenomena.

Another commendable feature of this book is Riley-Smith's fascinating treatment of the crusades, especially the main ones. Whether reading about the triumphs of the 1st and 3rd Crusades and the military prowess of Bohemond and Richard I, or reading about the serene resignation of Otto of Friesing and Bernard of Clairvaux after the debacle of the 2nd Crusade, Riley-Smith manages to make this history come alive. It was also bizarrely interesting to read of the strange course of events in the 4th Crusade that eventuated in the sack of Constantinople. Perhaps most bizarre was the story of Fredrick II, excommunicated from the church, who in the aftermath of the unsuccessful 5th crusade in Egypt managed to reoccupy Jerusalem as the Pope waged a crusade against Fredrick's own holdings. It is hard not to feel a little awe and sadness at the crusading career of Louis IX, whose open handed, creative, vigorous, self-sacrificing and successful efforts to raise money for his 2 crusades ultimately resulted in so little by way of accomplishment.

Riley-Smith has much to say about many other crusades as well. Something interesting he is able to accomplish is to make plain to the lay reader how various crusades were interrelated. For instance, many so called "political" crusades against papal opponents were actually of great strategic importance to crusading goals in the East. Crusades in the Baltic region served as a training ground for Palestine. Multiple crusading commitments often interfered with each other, as for instance when the Albigensian crusade dragged on for probably a decade longer than it needed to because the Pope Innocent III decided to shift his crusading focus elsewhere. And the permanent crusade in the Baltic and crusades in Spain often drained resources that might have been employed in the East.

The author also provides an informative account of the Latin settlements in Syria, Palestine, Asia Minor, and Greece, though sometimes trying to follow along with the dynastic intrigue proved tedious. Prior to reading this book, I had no idea how economically important culturally vibrant Acre became between the late 12th and mid 13th century. The reasons behind the Latin collapse in the East are clearly explained. I found it useful to learn that the Mamluk ruler Baybars was an even more effective general than was Saladin.

This book also provides a look at the 3 main military orders: the Hospitallers, the Templars, and the Teutonic Knights. The early history of these three orders is quite remarkable, as was the way that the Hospitallers and the Teutonic Knights were able to successfully reinvent themselves after the loss of Latin Palestine in 1291 and the destruction in the early 14th century of the Templars.

Riley-Smith thinks that Crusading was a protean and adaptable phenomenon, able to survive such developments as the Reformation and the rise of the Nation State, albeit in a weakened condition. It ultimately died a lingering death because of profound intellectual shifts occurring over centuries. "The moral theology on which it rested passed out of currency in two stages. In the sixteenth century Christ's authority for the use of force came to be challenged...Just-war arguments moved quickly from the field of moral theology to that of international law...The next stage in the evolution of modern justifications of violence was reached in the 19th century and was probably an achievement of the peace movement which swept Europe and America after the Napoleonic wars...The conviction that violence was intrinsically evil, unrecognized by earlier war theorists, was borrowed from pacifism and the argument was developed that force could nevertheless be condoned as the lesser of evils." (p.297-298) The surrender of the last functioning military order, the Hospitallers, at Malta to Napoleon in 1798 is thus a convenient marker for the end of the Crusading era, a physical occurrence nearly aligned with the completion of the broader intellectual changes.

It was something of a pleasant surprise to learn while reading that Riley-Smith is a contemporary member of the Hospitaller order. It seems quite fitting that someone with such a vital connection to the crusading past should write this well-received history.

This is an important book and well worth the effort.

[Ryan Patrick · Rating 2 out of 5]

In an effort to make his case for a pluralistic interpretation of crusading, employing his notion of sentient empathy, Riley-Smith has produced a bland and bewildering survey of the crusading movement. In his effort to include almost every manifestation of crusading, he fails to do justice to most of it. If you need a starting point for further research into some aspect of the crusades, this book might be helpful -- but you have to be prepared to do some more digging yourself to get the meat on the bones as it were. This rapid, whirlwind tour of the crusades will leave you at the end of each chapter saying, 'Woah, what did I just see?' as it all becomes a big blobby blur of battles, Baldwins, and barons. If you are looking for a more engaging if less-wide ranging account of the crusades, try Thomas Asbridge's The Crusades: The Authoritative History of the War for the Holy Land.

[GVG · Rating 1 out of 5]

Jonathan Riley Smith's writing style is unbearable and lifeless. Nearly every page of this book is virtually incomprehensible because of the sheer amount of run on sentences and the baffling level of information Smith bombards on the reader. It's impossible to discern what is happening because a new name and place is introduced in nearly every sentence. Reading this is probably the closest one can get to pulling teeth and watching paint dry although those activities might actually be more entertaining than having to slog through this.

[Christopher Litsinger · Rating 1 out of 5]

it took me 2 months to plow through this and it mostly felt like I was reading a bad high school history textbook.
This book is dry, eurocentric, diverts itself at times for infights with other historians, and sadly is one of the few books that comprehensively covers the crusades over almost 500 years.
I did learn enough of what I had set out to learn to plow through it but I don't feel especially happy about it.

[Anatolikon · Rating 4 out of 5]

Riley-Smith presents the crusade movement as an organism passing through the various stages of life. The crusades to the Levant receive the most attention here, but those in the Baltic, Iberia, and various internal crusades are considered part of the movement even if they are a bit of a sideshow. Riley-Smith sees the crusading spirit as dying in the fourteenth century, although he traces the end of the movement only to changing ideas of just war in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. This spirit is essential to Riley-Smith's vision of the crusades and the crusaders as people sincerely motivated by piety to go on dangerous and distant military expeditions.

[Sjors · Rating 3 out of 5]

There was an attempt... to cover a broad scope in a slender volume. Despite the dearth of pages, it took me long enough to chew to Riley-Smith's dry prose that skipped no opportunity to omit the colorful detail or drop the engaging anecdote. "Finally Runciman can be laid to rest, for Riley-Smith is here." quoth the flap blurb. Such nonsense.

[smallwin · Rating 3 out of 5]

作者用十字軍戰爭取代了東征，天主教對抗異教徒的歷史拉長到了19世紀
甚至還有意圖把第一次世界大戰也包含進來
有想講成『大歷史』的野心，卻沒多少更深入的論述
猜想這應該是作者研究的通論，瑣碎的介紹各領主們之間的關係、怎麼籌備戰爭和盤算

[Paul · Rating 3 out of 5]

When Boston Globe columnist James Carroll followed President Bush in applying the term "crusade" to the Iraq war (see Crusade: Chronicles of an Unjust War, 2004) - so that both advocate and critic named it thus - I decided I needed to know more about the crusades. Was this only hyperbole, or was there something in it? In Jonathan Riley-Smith's readable and reasonably concise (309-page) history, I found the latest scholarship well-presented in manageable and digestible prose.

The most remarkable thing I learned was how different is the picture modern scholars have of the crusades, from that I received in school thirty years ago. To us, the crusades were a bad idea of the medieval Church: a way to channel the restless energy of adolescent nobles as Europe sorted itself out after the collapse of Charlemagne's empire and the period of Viking invasions. They took place in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, after which the Church got either better ideas or more urgent distractions. Riley-Smith makes clear that while the crusades did get started at that time, they endured into modern times. The idea of a perpetual crusade took root in the 1220s, as the military adventures of the Danes and Germans in northeastern Europe began to be blessed and organized after the fashion of the Holy Land crusades. Forms and rituals of crusading began to serve cultural purposes of lending order and meaning to lives and society. Resistance to the 15th- and 16th-century invasions of eastern Europe by the Ottoman Turks was framed in crusading terms. Riley-Smith writes: "The crusading movement died a lingering death. By the fifteenth century growing disinterest in Germany and perhaps in France witnessed to disillusionment with the papacy. In the sixteenth century the Reformation reduced the Catholic population of Europe and involved everyone in introspective and bitter conflict. By the seventeenth century adherence to crusading was confined to the popes, those nations directly confronting the Turks and those families from which the [surviving Orders of knights] recruited their members." The last crusade was the Spanish Armada against England in 1588. The last order of crusading knights survived on the island of Malta until 1798. Europe was not distracted from crusading, nor did it find a better idea in the fourteenth century that put an end to it. Crusading was a vital and adaptable cultural force there well into the modern period. James Carroll suggests that it survives today.

If crusading did not end, why did it fade? Riley-Smith answers: "The moral theology on which it rested passed out of currency in two stages. In the sixteenth century Christ's authority for the use of force came to be challenged. ... Francisco de Vitoria [argued that] the chief justification of violence could not be divine plan, but had to be 'the common good'... Just-war arguments moved quickly from the field of moral theology to that of international law... God was removed from the equation and just war lost the lustre of divine approval. The next stage in the evolution of modern justifications of violence was reached in the nineteenth century... The conviction that violence was intrinsically evil ... was borrowed from pacifism and the argument was developed that force could nevertheless be condoned as the lesser of evils." And today James Carroll pushes back against an administration that argues for using violence as a means to the common good ("freedom"). So it's not hyperbole, this present-day talk of "crusade" - there's definitely something in it to ponder.

[Diogenes Grief · Rating 4 out of 5]

All that blood spilled, lives lost, and destruction wrought for earning the love of a Christian god . . .

This is a heavy, dense read, but it is also an exceptionally thorough undertaking spanning some 700 years of European, eastern European, North African, and Middle Eastern history. I wouldn't call it a narrative style at all, and what might be the most problematic issue for me is that there is not one citation in the entire book (though there is a 30-page bibliography at the end, complete with Riley-Smith's often colorful opinions). The Afterward is a mini historiography of how the Crusades were reflected upon over the centuries from both Muslim and Christian perspectives. The book is filled with fascinating characters, events, and eras, and the author does a nice job of being the objective historian, though it could be read as callous when treating battles as chess pieces and lost men as simple statistics. It takes a keen imagination to picture a legion being "slaughtered" wholesale. The bibliography does offer a nice scope for further reads, bracketed under headings.

What should be noted for contemporary times is that the Islamic concept of jihad came directly as a mirror to the wanton wars brought by the Crusades. Historical memory interwoven within culture is a juggernaut.

[Andrew Wehrheim · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an excellent introduction to Crusade history. Jonathan Riley-Smith is a preeminent crusade scholar and a champion of the now predominate school of crusade historiography called Pluralism. However, the additions of Susanna Throop are fresh and help expand current historiography. Smith comes from the era where crusade historiography was fixated on figuring out and articulating the most accurate definition of crusading. This was a helpful endeavor in many ways but can also create the problem of trying to fit the information that doesn't properly fit into predetermined definitions.

The additions and touch of Throop moves the narrative past this narrow emphasis on definitions and helps to provide a more layered and nuanced understanding of the crusades without abandoning definitions or downplaying the importance of them in guiding historiography and the interpretation of primary sources. This also covers the crusading which took place outside of Palestine and the Levant and beyond the thirteenth century. This is also a integral part of the Pluralist view and definition of crusading. Once again, this book is a great place for a reader who is interested in the history of the crusades to start. I highly recommend.

[Rob · Rating 4 out of 5]

Up until now, many of my assumptions about the Crusades had been derived from the (admittedly excellent) Ladybird book about Richard the Lion Heart but post war on terror and having just been given responsibility for commissioning new books in the field for perhaps the leading publisher in the field, I was recommended this overview as a good way of getting up to speed.

It's an excellent introduction albeit one that does inevitably assault the reader with a list of names which one could never have a hope of memorising but the broad structure of the tale - the dramatic First Crusade which saw the Christian armies take the Holy Land and it all being pretty much downhill from there ending in complete victory for Islam is very well told in engaging prose.

The author is especially good on the settlements set up in the so-called Latin East in the wake of conquests, the parallels and differences to colonialism (he plays down the links), the inevitable religious fervour and a superb annotated bibliography. I'm told that 'God's War' by Christopher Tyerman is a more comprehensive take on the subject (it's certainly longer) but this is a very good starting point.

[Derek Parsons · Rating 3 out of 5]

The author tries to conquer too much with too little space. Mr. Riley-Smith's attempt to comprehensively survey the Crusades in 300 pages ends up distilling the story into mostly rapid fire facts resulting in the book reading like a Wikipedia article, albeit a very long one. To the author's credit, it is well researched and does cover quite a bit of ground.

[J. Eric · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is filled with information about the history of the crusading movement. It is excellent as a reference!

[Henry Gao · Rating 5 out of 5]

19年第十三本。这才叫历史书！译注真是强势抢戏。作者花了200多页讲述了拉丁殖民地在东亚的建立和消亡，还要涉及大量的政治经济文化教义背景，真是着实不易。基本上所有的战争故事都被略过。部分篇幅由于要为完整性让道所以在时间线上有跳跃，故不建议0基础读者阅读。

[Mel Foster · Rating 4 out of 5]

The author argues we ought to have a more expansive and historically accurate view of the crusades and crusading, and encourages further thought about what exactly its definition is. He also documents and discusses the key people and events which shaped the theological perspectives regarding crusading, and invites more research into seeing events of the seventeenth century such as the defense of Vienna and of Venetian Crete in the light of crusading theology.

Crusading was much more than a cosmic conflict between Christian Culture and Islam. Crusades were employed against heretics on the home front such as the Albigensians and against pagans such as the Livonians and the Mongols. Crusading cannot be simplified into a proto-colonialism, nor an ethnocentrism. And struggles for family power, conflicts among monarchs, papal intrigues, and other realpolitik shaped many of the crusade events.

Riley-Smith explains the origins of the modern mistaken hagiographic views of crusading in the novels of Sir Walter Scott, the actions of German Emperor Wilhelm II regarding Saladin, and the statements of Ottoman Sultan Abdulhamid II in hopes of stirring up Islamic nationalism with him at the helm of the Muslim Empire. These contributions to returning historicity to modern understanding of crusading are valuable. His afterword briefly brings revisionist reading of crusading up to date through the "liberal, marxist, zionist, panIslamist," backreadings of history, up through attitudes towards more recent Soviet and American occupations in Asia.

His study of the evolution of the theology of crusading is also valuable, particularly the recurring tension between convincing individuals of the gospel being juxtapositioned against the use of force and even in a couple instances, such as the Wends, the threat of annihilation if they do not convert.

I enjoyed this book and found it valuable. It was not an easy read, and it took me months to finish. Replete with names & families, countries that no longer exist and towns that since have become obscure, anyone but a serious medievalist will need to refer to maps and have the internet handy, though there is a decent index to remind you of where a name was first discussed and maps which reference MOST of the needed geography. There is a solid bibliography of resources and recommended works for further study.

[Pedro Pascoe · Rating 4 out of 5]

Book 7 of a short reading course recommended by Norman F Cantor.
Possibly the only single volume you need to read regarding the Crusades phenomenon from go (1095) to whoa (1798).
The 'Big 4' are covered in detail, as one would expect, with attention being given to the 'internal' crusades as well. What becomes very clear over the course of the book is the increasingly desperate usage of 'crusades' for political ends, particularly involving heresy and schisms within the Catholic Church itself. One wonders just how long this phenomenon would have lasted if the First Crusade hadn't miraculously been as victorious as it was. One also wonders, as pointed out by critics of a later date, how much more effective keeping the Crusader states could have been if there had been a united will in Europe. But any cursory glance at European history knows the quicksand that would have been built on, what with its squabbles over its entire period, even with the veneer of papal guidance. Or perhaps because of it.
This book also keeps a clear account of the difference between a 'crusade' and other armed expeditions of a similar nature, which were also endemic during the same period.
In any event, a valuable account, even if it does tend to fall into lists of rulers towards the end, and an ideal starting point for further research into the various crusades throughout the ages

[Carlos · Rating 3 out of 5]

Let me start by saying that this book was exactly what I was looking for. The author gives the reader a comprehensive view of the extent, motivation and consequence of the crusading movement. By eschewing the obsession with numbering and the fruitless discussions of what can and cannot be called a crusade, Riley-Smith allows the reader to see the emergence of a movement that became fundamental to the development of Europe and the Middle East. Riley-Smith neither romanticizes nor dismisses the motivations of the men and women to took up the cross and neither does he hide the massive mistakes and inconsistencies that permeated the movement. By following the movement well past the point where most historians see its relevance he shows us its ideological death while laying the groundwork for exploring its historiography. Indeed, it is this analysis of the changing attitudes with which the crusades have been viewed by both western and eastern audiences that helped give the reader an understanding of the differing opinions that surround this subject. Finally, while the book can indeed be sometimes bogged down by the utter number of individuals involved in the crusading movement, it is still a great resource for anyone wanting to understand this oft-misunderstood period of history.

[David · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very detailed history depicting the Crusades..

And they are simply western bandits looking for wealth treasure expansion as well as what the Arabs were alike....

過去多年已經看了很多関於十字軍歷史
說真的，1100-1890 之間就是西方用宗教起義去搞中東⋯⋯一堆笨蛋去新天地搶別人的土地，財產⋯十字軍根本性就不神性
這一本也有500+頁，大全
目錄
地圖
第三版序
導論　十字軍遠征與歷史
第一章　聖戰與悔罪性戰爭
第二章　十字軍運動的誕生：對第一次十字軍東征的鼓吹
第三章　第一次十字軍東征的過程
第四章　諸聖地與耶路撒冷、安條克兩地的宗主教
第五章　拉丁東方的移居、治理、防衛，一○九七至一一八七年
第六章　青春期的十字軍遠征，一一○二至一一八七年
第七章　成年期的十字軍遠征，一一八七至一二二九年
第八章　壯年期的十字軍遠征，一二二九至約一二九一年
第九章　拉丁東方，一一九二至約一二九一年
第十章　多樣的十字軍遠征，約一二九一至一五二三年
第十一章　十字軍運動的苟延殘喘，一五二三至一八九二年
十字軍大事年表
十字軍國家王公世系簡表
現代文獻綜論

[Poet Felon · Rating 4 out of 5]

A Pluralist history that covers every crusade called for by the papacy. A great deal of information contained in one volume. It deals mostly with the theocratic justification and reasoning behind the crusades and gives little detailed information on the battles fought, but provides the reader with the broad strategic moves and aims of the crusades. A good book for people who want a deeper understanding of what the crusades were all about, but not for those who are interested mostly in the military aspects of the crusades.

[Carson Knauff · Rating 4 out of 5]

The introduction is incredible of the authors argument of why The Crusades happened. The only issue is that the argument is interesting because he is rejecting other perspectives on the crusades. What I did not know is that this is an awful introduction to the crusades and I got very little out of it. He expects you to read 20 names per page and have a working framework of the crusades. It’s extremely well written and well researched and important but not a good starting place.

[Daniel Hoffman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Clearly but densely written account of the Crusades. I didn't quote read the whole thing; I skimmed pretty heavily especially toward the end. Perhaps overdone in some of the details (too much on tax-policy, funding, etc), but a good and almost encyclopedic reference for a host of aspects of the Crusading movement from beginning to end, and even much of the historiography that came afterward.

[Adriane · Rating 2 out of 5]

The low rating is probably more due to my lack of a foundation in knowledge of the crusades than the author’s abilities. This book took me SEVERAL months, but I made it! Now I need to find The Crusades for Dummies and start again.

[Michael Wasson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Replaces Runciman as the standard history of the Crusades. A must read and a good starting point for study.

[Silvio Villa · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Non proprio breve, esauriente e a tratti avvincente, un ottimo testo introduttivo per chi non è del mestiere e non si accontenta del "sentito dire" su un argomento ultimamente troppo bistrattato."

[Mike McWhorter · Rating 5 out of 5]

Every sentence is packed with info

[Nancy Kendall]

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