The First Crusade: A New History (2005) - Plot & Excerpts
This is going to be a curious review for me. I want to begin by saying: I have not finished reading this book. There are good reasons for this.The first is: I’m not too big on history. I need a lot of context for my historical facts otherwise, try as hard as I might I forget everything I hear or read. That’s not say I don’t like history--I like it quite a bit--I just need to get it in small doses. The second is: Thomas Asbridge’s The First Crusade: A New History is not particularly dry or boring, it’s actually really fascinating and easier for me to read than a textbook (of the historical variety); it puts things in context. Historical figures are put into roles as characters, given motives and backstories, there are maps, illustrations, and full color photo panels of medieval artwork and modern day buildings that were once pivotal during the Crusades. It’s not quite an historical fiction novel, but I’m invested in the text anyway.If this were a historical fiction novel I can promise you I’d be finished by now. Since it isn’t, I think I’ll continue reading it as I have been: in small doses when I get the chance and not all in one go. I really want to understand the facts and research Asbridge has worked so hard to put together. Plowing through this would be unfair to the history and do an injustice to why I wanted to read it in the first place: to learn.There is a glossary and a chronology in the back of the book; for the die-hard historical fan there is even a bibliography and end notes to support Asbridge’s book and encourage further reading. My favorite so far is the chronology. It sort of sums up without explanation the very main points of Asbridge’s text along the timeline of the Crusades. The dates orient a reader who may be lost or not quite sure on some events, even after having finished. Once a section is completely read, you can go back to the chronology and see then all of the context and background that went into, for example, “The Council of Piacenza” (p. 342). In short: you can feel that you’ve learned something and walk away with a studious understanding of certain events and dates.Even though I’m reading this book from a more curious background when it comes to history, I’d still recommend it to readers interested in a real academic approach to the Crusades. All readers will appreciate the sincerity and depth of Asbridge’s narrative and feel at ease with his accessible prose and intelligent, articulate writing. I’m enjoying it a lot, despite reading it in bits and pieces. I’d like to think I’m not losing any momentum, but it’s such a wonderful read it would be hard to put down and never pick it up again.With that in mind, yes, I will eventually finish. Asbridge’s book is exciting and he does an excellent job infusing anticipation into his text and in turn, the reader will become anxious for more. The photos and illustrations are compelling and do help root the historical events to places and things we can see and perhaps one day, visit. I’ve found The First Crusade: A New History to be fascinating and will continue to read it. I suggest if you’re interested at all in the Crusades, you give Asbridge a chance!Thanks to Simon & Schuster UK for my review copy. :)
This is a general review of the history of the First Crusade, which was the expedition sent from Western Europe under the auspices of the Church of Rome, to capture and reclaim Jerusalem from her Muslim rulers. The flow of the narrative works rather well. Not too much time is spent on particularities of battles, but rather a broad picture is given so that the reader experiences the major points of contention in each skirmish, and the effects and aftereffects on the Crusading armies.Likewise, with an obviously huge cast, the author focuses in on a handful of Crusader princes, the Byzantine Emperor, and the Pope. We learn a bit about each man, but are not drowned in historical minutiae. The author makes great pains to stress that the original intent of the Crusades was indeed a holy one, but through hardship and exposure to new lands and the enticement of power, many of the Crusaders subjugated their religious fervor into the expropriation of power. Primarily, this books is about the Westerners, with some digression to the Byzantine Emperor and his court. The opposing Muslims war lords, however, are not fully explored. I think this does a great disservice to the book, and although the Muslims are not caricatures, they are not fully human, either. Their frame of mind is not explored, nor much of the history of how Islam became the dominant religious force in the area, nor much about how the various Islamic states, and their shifting alliances, came to beAdditionally, the author grazes over the differences between Latin and Greek Christians. At the time of the First Crusade, in 1098, the Great Schism was less than fifty years in the past. Instead of pointing merely to the increase in papal authority and ambition, and the rather minute differences in liturgical and spiritual life, a more thorough discussion about the Schism and political, as well as the theological, ramifications of it would have been helpful, particularly as the Crusaders left behind a few Latin bishops and patriarchs in place of the indigenous Greek/Byzantine ones. The concluding chapter rightly notes that the Crusade became a benchmark in later Christian/Islamic relations, but it was for Latin and Greek Christians, as well.Thankfully, this is not a hagiography of the Crusaders, and we are not spared the atrocities committed by the Crusaders in the name of their God. They were definitely a bloody bunch, with no problems massacring the elderly, women, children, and infants in the cities they overran. The bloodbath committed in Jerusalem is particularly revolting. Although the Muslim treatment of people they conquered is not mentioned, in warfare, both sides were brutal and savage, as it seems to be the way war was waged in those times.Worth checking into if you'd like a brief history of the First Crusade. The book is actually just 339 pages, the rest being a glossary, footnotes, and selected bibliography.
What do You think about The First Crusade: A New History (2005)?
Thomas Asbridge brings the First Crusade vividly to life in this improbably enjoyable and well-researched book that does a good job of focusing on the personalities of the people involved. Along the way, Asbridge also debunks a few of the once-popular myths about the crusades, such as that medieval Europeans embarked on them to get rich, or that they were disproportionately fought by younger sons who lacked the lands and titles enjoyed by their elder brothers.I would have given the book another star but for the fact that Asbridge cannot escape his own academic bias in two instances: First, he uses the abbreviation "C.E." in dates, and that's the politically-correct but wholly unnecessary replacement for the venerable "A.D." Second, and more importantly, while Asbridge takes a longer view than some of his colleagues in tracing the roots of conflict between Christians and Muslims back to the First Crusade, he tiptoes right past the arguably more accurate assertion that such conflict could be traced back to the life and career of Mohammed. Despite those biases and the author's occasionally annoying use of quotation marks to flag items about which he is skeptical, this is a compelling history that succeeds on its own terms. Asbridge tries to be fair, and his writing is never boring. I'd recommend the book to anyone with an interest in medieval times.
—Patrick
JIHAD FOR JESUS This book by medieval scholar Thomas Ashbridge's is an attempt at a history of the First Crusade (1095-99) that draws on new developments in scholarship to create a narrative that is accessible to the general reader. Initially Ashbridge is concerned with presenting a picture of the medieval world in which the Crusade was rooted, with particular focus on the mentality of that world in general, and the doctrine of sanctified violence in particular which would seem to be somewhat at odds with Christian teaching. He moves on to an account of the council at Clermont, in which Pope Urban II made his call for a Crusade to "liberate" the holy land and Jerusalem from Muslim control, and the efforts he made to ensure that the Crusade actually happened.Of particular interest, in view of some of the contemporary debate that issues from those who might be categorised as Islamaphobes, is the issue of the rational behind the Crusade. Ashbridge summarises the evidence, and comes to the conclusion that it was re-active rather than pro-active, rooted in religious politics of the Christian Western Europe and their prejudices vis-à-vis the Islamic other. He is worth quoting at some length on this matter:"The Muslim faith acknowledged and respected Judaism and Christianity, creeds with which it enjoyed a mutual reliance on authorative scripture. Christian subjects may not have been able to share power with their Muslim masters, but they were given freedom of worship. All around the Mediterranean basin, Christian faith and society survived and even thrived under the watchful but tolerant eye of Islam. Eastern Christendom may have been subject to Islamic rule, but it was not on the brink of annihilation, nor prey to any form of systematic abuse."Ironically, at the time of the first Crusade, the only place in the Mediterranean world where this tolerance was in question was in Iberia, thousands of miles away from the object of the First Crusade. The story of the Crusades itself is told in a workmanlike manner, starting with a pogrom of Jews in Germany, moving through the Byzantine Empire and into the Muslim East. Eventually, after a good few sieges, a good deal of in-fighting, battles, intrigue, pillage, massacres and some cannibalism, the holy warriors arrive at Jerusalem. The city at the "navel of the world" is besieged, captured, the Muslim population slaughtered, their goods stolen and the Christians sects in the city thrown out of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre to make way for their ostensible saviours.The Crusades are not a subject I have any great knowledge of, so it is a testament to Ashbridges skill as a writer and scholar that I felt I came away from his work with some understanding of the medieval world and the events of the First Crusade. Obviously, given that he is writing about events nearly a millennium ago, there are elements of speculation and conjecture but these are always clearly signposted and accompanied with quotations from contemporary sources. Not a book to enjoy, unless your of a sadistic disposition, but one that certainly gives a comprehensive and fascinating account of a key event in early Christian-Muslim relations.
—Simon Wood
To appreciate that allot of history is simply ‘myth-history’ you need to read about how the man who unleashed the First Crusade (Pope Urban 11) used propaganda to portray Muslims as brutal oppressors when in reality Islam had showed more tolerance to other religions than Catholic Christendom in the preceding centuries. During the years 1000 to 1300 CE Catholic Europe and Islam went from being occasional combatants to completely entrenched opponents and the chilling reverberations of this seismic shift still echo in the world today … Everybody should read this book!!!
—Stuart Chambers
