Even so, we must still acknowledge the terrible inhumanity of the crusaders’ sadistic butchery. Certainly, some of Jerusalem’s inhabitants were spared; Iftikhar ad-Daulah for one took sanctuary in the Tower of David and later negotiated terms of release from Raymond of Toulouse. But the Frankish massacre was not simply a feral outburst of bottled rage; it was a prolonged, callous campaign of killing that lasted at least two days and it left the city awash with blood and littered with corpses. In the midsummer heat the stench soon became intolerable, and the dead were dragged out beyond the
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