The siege of Jerusalem : crusade and conquest in 1099 / Conor Kostick.
"The most extraordinary siege in medieval history began with the arrival of a Christian army at Jerusalem on the dawn of 7 June 1099. There were other sieges that lasted longer, involved greater numbers of troops and deployed more siege engines, but nothing else in the entire medieval period co...
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| Format: | Book |
| Language: | English |
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London ; New York :
Continuum,
2009.
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| Summary: | "The most extraordinary siege in medieval history began with the arrival of a Christian army at Jerusalem on the dawn of 7 June 1099. There were other sieges that lasted longer, involved greater numbers of troops and deployed more siege engines, but nothing else in the entire medieval period compares to the extraordinary journey that the besiegers had made to get to their goal and the heady religious direction they had been given by the pope and by itinerant popular preachers." "This was the culmination of the First Crusade, a military pilgrimage that had seen hundreds of thousands of men, women and children leave their homes in Western Europe, march for three years over thousands of miles and undergo tremendous hardship to reach their longed-for goal : Jerusalem. The environment outside of the city was a harsh one, above all because of the heat of the summer sun and a lack of water. The longer the city held out, the more the Christian forces lost strength. And rumours of the imminent arrival of a massive Egyptian relieving force made the siege a deadly race: either the crusaders would quickly find a way to storm the city or they would be annihilated." "Here is a vivid and engaging account of the events of that siege: the key figures, the turning points, the spiritual beliefs of the participants, the deep political rivalries and the massacre of the inhabitants that left such a deep scar in the horrified imagination that it still evokes passionate feelings nearly a thousand years later."--BOOK JACKET. |
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| Physical Description: | xii, 211 pages, 12 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations (chiefly color), color maps ; 24 cm. |
| Bibliography: | Includes bibliographical references (pages [195]-203) and index. |
| ISBN: | 9781847252319 1847252311 |