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 | | The Oxford Illustrated History of the Crusades (Oxford Illustrated Histories) by Jonathan Riley-Smith (Editor) ISBN-10: 9780198204350 ISBN-10: 0-19-820435-3 ISBN-13: 9780198204350 ISBN-13: 978-0-19-820435-0 Hardcover 1995-10-19 Oxford University Press, USA Find Lowest Price |
Editorials | ||
Product Description Nine hundred years ago, at a church council in Clermont, Pope Urban II delivered an impassioned sermon, calling upon Frankish knights to vow to march to the East to free Christians from the yoke of Islamic rule and to liberate the tomb of Christ, the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, from Muslim control. Thus began the Crusades: the bloody and grueling battles pitched between European knights and the Islamic defenders over the course of two hundred years, movements that created the legends of King Arthur and the Holy Grail, military orders such as the Knights Templar, and an unusually rich tradition of art and architecture. In The Oxford Illustrated History of the Crusades, the story of the Crusades is told as never before in an engrossing, authoritative, and comprehensive history that ranges from the preaching of the First Crusade in 1095 to the legacy of the crusading ideals and imagery that continues today. Here are the ideas of apologists, propagandists, and poets about the Crusades, as well as the perceptions and motives of the crusaders themselves and the means by which they joined the movement--crusaders were required to "take the cross" (which involved making a vow, often at an emotional public gatherings under the influence of preachers whose business it was to whip their audiences up into a frenzy) and were foresworn to wear a cross on their clothing until they returned from their mission in the East. The authors describe the elaborate social and civic systems that arose to support the Crusades--taxation, for example, was formalized by the Church and monarchs to raise enormous funds needed to wage war on this scale; nearly 1,000,000 livres tournois were raised from the French church (out of estimated total expenses of some 3,000,000 livres) for Louis IX's first crusade in 1248. And here are vivid descriptions of the battles themselves, frightening, disorienting, and dangerous affairs, with keen and insightful commentary on the reactions of the Muslims to a Christian holy war. Extensively illustrated with hundreds of illustrations, maps, chronologies, and a guide to further reading, The Oxford Illustrated History of the Crusades even includes coverage of crusades outside the eastern Mediterranean region and post-medieval crusades. From descriptions of the battles and homefront conditions, to a throrough evaluation of the clash (and coalescence) of cultures, to the legacy of the crusading movement that continues into our conflict-torn twentieth-century, to the enduring artistic and social changes that the Crusades wrought, The Oxford Illustrated History of the Crusades offers an unsurpassed panorama of one of the great movements in western history. This beautiful work will engage and inform anyone with an interest in the Crusades. | ||
Reviews | ||
Historical facts. No more. This is a very important book for people who want to know the facts without stories of romance and chivalry. It is very well organized with chapters dedicated to all the aspects of life from the time of the Crusades, aspects ranging from the military orders in various periods of time to the evolution of crusading literature. I recommend this book for people who need an overview of the period of the Crusades. It is also advisable, in order to comprehend the whole picture of the Crusades, to read opinions from the Muslim side. A very good book in this region is "Arab Historians of the Crusades" (The Islamic World Series) by Francesco Gabrieli. | ||
High-gloss paper w/ a straight-forward approach to the Crusades This is an intro book to the Crusades. What I liked about The Oxford Illustrated History of the Crusades was it's very 'neat' look at history. It is a clean-cut array of events in prose form, with several pictures and illustrations, without moral position taken. This way, the reader can use the information given and put it into a context of discussion and a wider analysis of the time period covered. The only down-side was probably that, having used it in a classroom setting, I felt almost as if it were too 'story-book', too illustrative. The information, however, is substantial. | ||
An excellent tome on the crusades to begin your historical journey! The Oxford Illustrated History of the Crusades introduced me to several aspects of the military campaigns and enduring influences they had which I had never been exposed. I have read other books on this topic and have learned a great deal, however, additional topics such as poetry, song and architecture were items which up until my reading of this book I had not even considered. After reading this book you will realize as perhaps as I that one has merely scratched the surface of Crusade history. I highly recommend this source if you would be interested in getting a bigger and better picture of this often misunderstood and oft-maligned period of history in western civilization. | ||
Not a book for the general public On the back cover you can read: "written by a team of leading scholars, this richly illustrated book.....presents an authoritative and comprehensive history of the Crusades from the preaching of the First Crusade in 1905 to the legacy of crusading ideas and imaginery today". In fact it is a book written by scholars for scholars only and it is very different from the other many books about the Crusades that follow a cronological description of the history of the events that took place. The book is composed of 15 chapters, written by different authors, that have little or no coordination at all, so it is no informative. The contents are very descriptive of the orientation of the book: ... Songs of the crusades, Architecture in the latin east, Images of the crusades in the 19th and 20th centuries, Revival and Survival (the orders today). As good scholars they authors also plague the book with a lot of fashionalbe, weird and mislead theories, very much repeated along the book like that the spanish reconquista was part of the crusades. The book has many pictures, and some of the articles-chapters are interesting because they focus more deeply on a given issue, but it doesn't treat adequately the history of the crusades, the fears, pains, feats and ambitions of the crusaders, the way of life on the Holy Land, and the daily relationships between the several clashing cultures. After reading the book you will not have a true picture about the flow of events that lead to the Crusades and their outcome. At the most it is a book for those that already have many other books on the subject, and want to have a look to its pictures and know a particular point of view of some of its authors. Definitely not worth buying for the general public as one of the first readings. | ||
Review of Oxford Illustrated History of the Crusades By:Jonathan Riley-Smith Reviewed by:D. Wang P.5 The Oxford Illustrated History of the Crusades is a book about you want and don't want to know about the crusades. The book's opening chapters aren't about the actual military action at all. It's about the minds of the crusaders, the songs of the time, the Latin East. It's not until chapter nine that military orders, movements, and actions are mentioned. The book concludes with a comparison of modern day events and the crusades. I liked this book because of the sheer amount of information. on page 86 it says "Men and women, including elderly crusaders, came to Jerusalem to end their days. The charnel chambers in the Hospitallers' ruined twelfth-century cemetry-church at Alcheldamach, just outside Jersalem, are still filled with the bones of pious Christians." It is extremely doubtful you will find this variety of information in a textbook. This book really took the effort to find all the information possible. An entire chapter of the book is devoted to songs about the crusade. There are not many books about a series of wars where an entire chapter is devouted to songs. The book puts a lot a information and visual material in 436 pages. It is very easy to be overwhelmed, and the authors should have made it easier to comprehend. My favorite part of the book is the last chapter. "In a surprising development, however, the theology of force that underpinned crusading has been revived, especially in Latin America, by a militant wing of Christian Liberation." It is amzing how we humans fall from the same things over and over again, and this chapter previews of what might come. I like to compare our present to our past because it makes you realize how many times we've made the same mistake over and over again. Sometimes we just fail to take the past into consideration. | ||