Heres a paper I wrote a while ago too, this time about the Crusades. Typical grammatical errors etc. Enjoy. (PS. I should have gotten extra credit for using my Medieval Europe Class readings in this one - anything mentioning Joinville (Jean-V is how its pronounced) comes from my Medieval course.
Religious Views and Foundations of Globalization
Crusaders and Religious Views
The Crusades represent a very important time in history. The notion of Christendom inspired thousands to march under the banner of Christianity against hordes of Muslims to reclaim the Holy Land. But the typical western Christian did not know a thing about his Muslim enemy. Over the course of the Crusades, very little was done to further understand the Muslim enemy and what they believed in. Only a select few discovered what lay behind the hordes of Muslims. Despite their hatred for the Muslims through the years of bloodshed, the western European Christians (the French – Franks) brought back important technology with them which would forever change Europe. The Crusades also set the foundation of Globalization through the Italian City-States and the acquired taste for Mid-Eastern goods that, post-crusades, would spark trade that ran from Europe to Africa, the Mid-East to the Far-East. The Crusades ultimately led to a better understanding of Islam and a spread of Muslim technology, along with goods from the Far East, throughout Europe.
Origins of the Crusades
The First Crusade of 1096 was not the first war where Christians tried to reclaim Christian land controlled by the Muslims. The Moors had conquered southern Spain from the Visigoths during the 8th Century and had even made excursions into Southern France but the Franks managed to defeat them there
[1]. Almost immediately the Spanish Reconquista began but it was not until 1078 AD that it reached an important stage. In 1078 the Spanish recaptured the very important city of Toledo in central Spain. Toledo was one of the biggest cities in Spain at the time and its location was essential to the conquest of Spain. Amongst other things, the capture of Toledo brought “…ancient Greek scholarship to the notice of western European scholars through the recovery of the extensive library at Toledo in 1085.”
[2] The writings of Aristotle and Homer had previously not been known to Europeans; only the bookkeeping skills of the Muslims had preserved such writings. The Spaniards close contact with Muslims did little to shed light on Islam. There was no attempt to understand the religion or its peoples. The Muslims were allowed to keep and practice their religion, but the Christians still understood very little of it.
Things would come to a head in 1095 when Pope Urban II began actively preaching against Islam and stirred up a large army to march to the Holy Land and reclaim it for the Christians. The Crusade would not only serve to reclaim the Holy Land but was also launched in an attempt to show good-will towards the Byzantines and return them to the control of the Pope.
Byzantine and the Great Schism
The Byzantine Church split from the Pope in what is known as the Great Schism. The West – Rome – was seen as too far away to hold any sway over politics and religion in the region and the Orthodox Church was born, believing that no individual should hold sway over religion. Understandably, this caused the Pope to become angered but nothing seemed to be able to bring the Orthodox Church back under the Pope. The Byzantine empire was in its decline, however, and there was “constant warfare among the Byzantines (Greeks), Arabs, Seljuk Turks, and Armenians.”
[3] The Armenians where a Christian Kingdom that had long served as a buffer between Byzantium and the Muslims, but the Persians and Seljuks had ravished the Armenians and had managed to attack the Byzantines. Combined with “…the weakening of Armenia under the Byzantine emperors, and the collapse of Byzantine power at Manzikert (1071)”
[4] the Byzantine Empire was in dire straits and needed help.
Emperor Alexius Commenus realized that the soldiers he needed to defend Byzantine from the Seljuks had to come from the West. He knew that “[i]n the old days, the bulk of the empire’s troops had come from Anatolia, and now Anatolia was almost entirely lost.”
[5] The Seljuk’s control of the area prevented the Emperor from using troops from the area. Commenus also realized that he could not rely on the Mercenary groups in the region either, as they tended to be unreliable when fighting against Muslim foes. He only had one choice left – an army from the West.
During the middle of the Crusades, some of the smaller Christian Kingdoms that had been created were under pressure. Through treaties or by selling off their Kingdom to the Byzantines, the rulers of these lesser kingdoms tried to gain protection with the aid of the Byzantines. However, “…the Byzantines proved incapable of assuring the defence of the places they had acquired.”
[6] This further brought the destruction of the Byzantine Empire about.
Christendom
Perhaps the greatest aid to Pope Urban II was a growing idea that was widespread throughout the lands of the Christians. Christendom. Christendom was “…a militant community of Christians whose thoughts and will were directed towards the Holy Land and consumed with the struggle against the Muslims, who were now considered the ‘enemies of God and holy Christendom’”
[7] Christians did not see themselves as part of a country, like France, but as a part of the greater Christendom which united all Christians under its banner. The idea of Christendom was the driving force behind the Crusades.
The Crusades were not only directed towards Muslims but other groups of people – like Jews – who were not of the Christian faith. It would even be turned against other Christians who the Pope had deemed had strayed from the path and threatened Christendom. Unsurprisingly, Christendom is often associated with the Holy Roman Empire and is in fact the same ‘Kingdom’ – both answering to the Pope and encompassing all Christians. This was the first time in Western European history that all the people were united under one banner.
Pope Urban II
The mastermind behind the First Crusade was Pope Urban II. To stir Christendom into a fervor to go on this Crusade he preached that “Christians living in the East, he alleged, were enduring dreadful oppression and abuse at the hands of their ‘savage’ Muslim masters, and the epicenter of Christian tradition, the Holy City of Jerusalem, likewise lay in the grasp of Islam.”
[8] This is also one of the first examples where Muslims are referred to something as inhuman as a ‘savage’. Urban II not only wanted to restore Anatolia to the Byzantines but to also secure safe passage for pilgrims to reach the Holy Land and city of Jerusalem. To make the Crusade even more attractive, he made it sound like those going on the Crusade would be ‘soldiers of God’ and that they would be cleansed of all sins by carrying out Gods will.
[9]
Urban II managed to convince an estimated 70,000 people - peasantry, soldiers, knights – to march to Constantinople and reclaim land for the Byzantine’s before marching through Syria and successfully taking Jerusalem from the Seljuk’s who controlled it.
[10] His vision was not only to bring the Orthodox Byzantines back under the Catholic Church but also to secure the Holy Land.
The First Crusade presented several problems for its leaders. Supplying such a vast army was nearly impossible to do with out them ravaging the countryside. The Crusaders were so disgruntled with this lack of food that they almost ransacked the city of Constantinople instead of continuing on their journey. Disaster was barely averted but future Crusades would be better supplied. The Crusade consisted of several parties traveling different routes to converge on Constantinople. This brought several leaders into contention with each other and would last through out the rest of the Crusades. These battling leaders usually prevented the Crusades from being a success. Unlike the Muslims, they failed to put their differences behind them and become a solid, unified force. Nevertheless, the First Crusade was successful in restoring land to the Byzantines and also capturing Jerusalem and the Holy Land.
The Muslim World
How was this possible? Muslim expansion had led them into Spain, Sicily, Southern Italy and across Africa. They had proven to be superior to Europeans but had now been beaten badly by a Crusading army and had lost Jerusalem. Such a powerful force could surely defeat a Crusading Army. The Muslim world, at the time, was split and unconcerned with what it viewed as a Byzantine Army reclaiming Byzantine land.
The Seljuk Empire, which had taken Byzantine land, had split due to a civil war, creating several kingdoms. Each kingdom was more concerned with controlling their region and waging war on their neighbor that the Crusaders caught them by surprise. Unified, they would have been able to hold off the Crusaders – as subsequent Crusades would show – but separate as they were, the Crusaders managed to push them aside on their march to Jerusalem.
The Muslims that were in any position to oppose the Crusaders did not do so until it was too late and were also beaten back, though not defeated as a conquered people. The Fatimids, who controlled Jerusalem at the time, thought that the Franks – the Crusaders – would stop once they had taken Syria. Unknown to the Fatimids, that was not the final goal of the Crusade and soon the Franks had conquered Palestine and Jerusalem.
The result of this First Crusade placed Muslims under Christian rule, gave birth to several Christian states in Palestine and also unified the Muslims against a common enemy.
Religious Views
Muslims were more tolerant of Christians – ‘people of the book’ – then Christians were of Pagans. Muslims did not view the invaders as Christians: “they were always known as Franks.”
[11] Franks (the French) often settled the land they conquered in Palestine, drawn by the riches and the sense of having fulfilled their duties in the Holy Land. It only made sense for them to stay on. It was these Christians along with those that were converted in the region that came to understand Islam and not view Muslims as monsters as much of Europe did.
Western Europe had little interaction with Muslims until the Crusades. The Spaniards, on the other hand, had lots of interaction with Muslims but did nothing to learn their ways or religious beliefs. They often referred to all Muslims as “…Saracens, Turks, Arabs, Persians (especially when referring to the Mesopotamians), Parthians, ‘Agulari’ and ‘Azirniti’”
[12] and not their true ethnicity. It would be the equivalent of calling all Christians ‘Franks’ when in fact they all come from different regions of Europe. Muslims were not always the enemy of Christendom.
Medieval Scholars generally paid littler attention to the exploits of the Muslims, barely mentioning them in histories prior to the Crusades. Scholars brief mention of Muslims was generally neutral, but “[t]he manner in which early medieval chroniclers spoke of the Saracens became harsher, however, when Arab expansion reached Frankish lands.”
[13] As Muslims began to threaten Christendom they started to be viewed in a different light.
As Pope Urban II began to preach for a Crusade against the Muslim enemy, he began to talk harshly of the Muslims, comparing them “to locusts, devastating everything they could reach”
[14] while also spreading rumors of the cruelty pilgrims face at the hands of the Muslims. This all served to further stir up Christians towards Holy War against the Muslims.
The general ignorance towards Islam existed amongst all levels of Europeans. The typical peasant only knew about Muslims from what he heard being preached by monks and priests. Pope Urban II turned them into the “…fundamental enemy of Christendom: the personification of the very religion of the Antichrist.”
[15] It was partially for this reason that so many people answered the call to go on the Crusade against the Muslim enemy.
Arab Christians, on the other hand, found themselves in an interesting situation. Instead of paying taxes to Constantinople they were instead paying them to a Caliph in Baghdad or Damascus. They also had “…professional or intellectual expertise for which Muslims courted them and paid well.”
[16] The Muslim faith places Muslims as superior to other ‘people of the book’ but that did not mean that ‘people of the book’ saw themselves as inferior to Muslims. Arab Christian monks and scholars were the only ones familiar with the Qur’an but often used it to back up their own claims of faith and did not treat it as a separate religion.
[17]
The 7th Crusade
Following the capture of Jerusalem, the Muslims put aside their differences and were unified under Saladin. Saladin reclaimed Jerusalem for the Muslims and defeated the Christian defenders in the region. Subsequent Crusades all failed in their objectives of capturing Jerusalem again and the Christian Kingdoms that had been set up after the First Crusade were all soon vanquished. The last Crusade was also led by a Frank – King Louis IX of France – who went on the Crusade for religious reasons. Shortly after his death, the Pope canonized him and made him a Saint.
The 7th Crusade was different then the First Crusade. Attacking through Palestine to take Jerusalem had failed countless times and a different approach had been used during the Fifth Crusade. King Louis decided to follow in the footsteps of the 5th Crusade. Instead of attacking through Palestine, the 7th Crusade would land in Egypt and capture Damietta, a vastly important port-city in Egypt. Once they had acquired Damietta they would then trade it for Jerusalem and a sliver of land that would ensure safe passage for Pilgrims to Jerusalem.
Much like the 5th Crusade, the 7th Crusade started off rather successfully. But like the 5th Crusade, the leaders of the 7th Crusade got greedy and tried to take more land then they had set off to conquer. This hubris pride of the Crusaders, apparent in all of the Crusades, led to the defeat and capture of King Louis and his army. King Louis managed to raise funds for his ransom and was eventually freed but returned to France having gained nothing. Several years later he embarked on another Crusade, though this one was ill fated from the start and he died while in Tunis, not even close to the objective of the Crusade. This marked the end of the Crusades which had forced the Christian Kingdoms in Palestine to leave. But Christendom still held sway in the region, the “…Kingdom of Jerusalem retreated to Cyprus, protected by the military orders that had been formed to defend the Holy Land and that now began to build new bastions of Christendom in other Mediterranean islands, such as Rhodes and Malta.”
[18]
Unchanged Views
Over one-hundred years had passed since the First Crusade but little had changed in Europe. Muslims were still viewed as the Enemy of Christendom and were treated as such. But the Europeans had started to fall out of love with the idea of the Crusades, which had increasingly been turned to fight other Christians who did not conform to the ideas of the Pope or who displeased him.
Jean Joinville, a Seneschal and close friend of King Louis IX of France, sheds light on how Muslims were viewed at the time of the 7th Crusade. He outlived King Louis and lived on into his 90’s and was perhaps one of the most well educated men in France at the time. He would have been able to attain resources that many other people would not have been able to attain.
Joinville’s general ignorance of Muslims is clearly shown in how he refers to the Muslim foe the Crusaders face at Damietta. Joinville landed (by boat) “…in front of a great body of Turks…”
[19] while a page later he states that the “…Saracens sent messages…”
[20] before turning back to calling them Turks. He was most likely referring to the Mameluk Soldiers who would shortly stage a revolt against their rulers and take over Egypt.
As the campaign progresses, Joinville comes into contact with more groups of Muslims and begins to understand them. The Bedouins are the first group of people he begins to describe as separate from the Saracens/Turks. He even knows of their religious beliefs: “They do not follow Mahomet, but accept the teaching of Ali, who was Mahomet’s uncle…these people believe that when a man dies for his lord, or in any other good cause, his soul goes into another body, a better and a happier one then before.”
[21] This is the first time we see any European Christian make an attempt to learn about a group of Muslims. He goes on to talk about how they live, what they wear, how they believe no one can die before their appointed day, and how they curse their children by calling them Franks.
[22] His views may seem positive but any sort of positive feeling one gets is quickly quelled by the last thing he says about the Bedouins: “Their heads are all bound round with cloths that go underneath the chin, so that, what with these and the jet-black colour of their hair and their bears, they are an ugly people, and frightful to look at.”
[23] Clearly his view on them is not a positive one. Joinville also points out that back in France, since the Crusade, he has come across Christians who follow some of the same ideas and how he (Joinville) thinks this is a direct denial of Christianity, “…saying that God has no power to help us.”
[24]
Joinville next talks of the Old Man of the Mountain, the leader of the Assassins. At this point, he goes into more detail about the religious differences. He mentions that “…those who observe the laws laid down by Ali affirm that those who follow Mahomet are misbelievers, while those who accept the teaching of Mahomet maintain on their side that the followers of Ali are unsound in their faith.”
[25] Joinville is perplexed by their belief that no man can die before his appointed day, saying that “[t]his is a belief that no man should hold, seeing that God has power to prolong our lives or to shorten them as He pleases.”
[26] The Assassins are paid homage by the Sultans to prevent them from claiming their lives.
The Tartars are the last people Joinville goes into detail about. It is when talking about the Tartars that it is clear that Joinville is in awe of them. He begins by describing the events that led up to the Tartars coming about, as the Tartars had conquered and destroyed many people. He relates a story of how a Prince met the Lord of heaven and earth and was told to listen and follow the priests and monks they had captured from Prester John (a fabled Christian King who ruled in Persia)
[27]. This the Prince did and he and his people were converted to Christianity. He learns that “[w]henever the Tarts wish to make war on the Saracens they send these Christians to fight against them, and on the other hand employ the Saracens in any war against Christians. Childless women of all classes go with the army on campaigns, and these are paid at the same rate as the men, according to their strength and vigor.”
[28] Joinville seems more intrigued and impressed with the Tartars then any other group he comes across in the Middle East. As to how they had subjugated so many other kingdoms, Joinville learns that the Tartars threatened their enemies that their allies – the King of France – would come and destroy them.
[29] This threat seemed to work rather well and could only make the French feel proud of their reputation in the area.
Beyond these extravagant descriptions of these groups of people he came across, Joinville barely mentions them again. He makes no attempt to teach others that Muslims are not all just Saracens. Nor does he mention them again once he returns to France. If anything, he still views all Muslims as Saracens and Saracens still remain the great enemy of Christendom.
End of the Crusades
The end of the Crusades brought a cease to the conflict between Christians and Muslims in the Middle East. Conflict could not be continually averted between the two religions as the Ottoman Turks made vast gains into the Balkans, much further then any Crusader army made into the Middle East.
The Crusades did see a drastic change in Europe. Returning Crusaders not only brought back exotic goods and other spoils of war, but also more advanced technology and medicine then was previously known in Europe. European Castles up until the Crusades had been made out of wood. In the Middle East, castles were made out of stone. The Crusaders brought back this stone-building technology which forever changed the face of Europe. They also brought back more advanced medicine and other Muslim scientific technologies along with arithmetic, perhaps one of the greatest inventions of all.
Many Crusaders had been motivated by the thoughts of attaining glory and loot while on the Crusades, it is the “…Church’s subjective act of repentance for past sin that matters.”
[30] Many of the Knights who went on Crusades were not in need of the money they could look forward to making if they survived. For many people, the act of going to the Holy Land and dieing for God was what drove them there. It was the driving force behind the 6th Crusades after the first one to reclaim Jerusalem for the Christians.
Foundations of Globalization
Trade with the Muslim world really began in earnest during the Crusades. Palestine, the Holy Land, and the Middle East were actually places in the world, not just in the bible, to many Europeans as the Crusades began. The contact with Muslims in Spain, Sicily and Italy had provided interaction with Muslim traders but mainly in the Maghreb – modern day Morocco. The Crusades were targeting a new area and the spoils they brought back to Europe were new to the area.
The Middle East is a desolate in many places, with few trees or raw materials to use especially for ship building. Because of this, the Pope “…prohibited the export to Muslim lands of wood, ships, naval stores, war materials and iron, and Christian slaves.”
[31] The Muslims could not wage war with out these goods, but this only made these supplies become worth more as the demand grew. Christian traders, especially the Italian City States that were formed around the Crusades, went against the Pope and continued to trade these goods as there was nothing the Pope could do to stop them. Ultimately, the Pope gave in and began to tax the trade of these goods to make some sort of profit off of it.
The formation of the Latin States in the Holy Land further added to the power and wealth of the Italian City States. “The merchant cities of Italy, Genoa, Venice, and Pisa benefited from the trading rights that they were given in the Latin East.”
[32] The merchants managed to get a foothold in the Middle East and would continue to retain trading colonies in the region even after the Latin States had been conquered by the Muslims. The Crusades themselves also gave rise to the Italian City States, as money to pay the troops, supplies of all kinds had to be bought, and the fact that Italy was often the launching off point for flotillas heading to the Middle East. Banking, for instance, came into being to finance the Crusades.
Merchants were amongst the few Europeans who began to see a much larger world “…becoming aware of cultures far to the East, beyond Byzantium and beyond Islam.”
[33] The end of the Crusades brought peace – for a time – back to the region and trade could resume uninterrupted and with less risks due to the deals that had been made. Goods from the Far East – places like India and China – began to reach the Middle East and then move on into Europe. None of this would have been possible with out the formation of the Italian City-States “[b]ecause of the demands of crusading, European governments were forced to develop and improve their systems of administration more quickly then they might otherwise have done, thereby hastening the development of the modern state.”
[34] This development would lead to the Renaissance in Italy and would allow Europe to develop into a place where it surpassed the technology and advancements of the Muslim world.
Despite the apparent lack of understanding and general dislike for Muslims, traders seemed to be the only people who could set aside their differences and interact in a peaceful manner with each other.
Changing Views
Not everything associated with the Crusades and Muslims ended in a negative or neutral light. This interaction with Muslims on a wide-scale range meant that views were changing. Not only had Christians fought against Muslims, but they had also settled in Muslim territory, took on Muslim customs or ideas, and had even taken on Muslim or Arab wives. Pope Urban II during the First Crusade had preached that Muslims were like locusts. Now, however, the views had changed into more positive, realistic views. For instance, “Muslim men came to be viewed as romantic, dashing, chivalric warriors, while Muslim women were either beautiful, intelligent, resourceful, and loyal, or wise, resourceful, and cunning.”
[35] Truly a change from how they had original been thought of or portrayed.
Muslims, on the other hand, viewed Christians in a less positive light. They “…admired the Christian warriors’ courage but regarded them as rash and uncultured, and uncaring about the honor of their womenfolk.”
[36]
Conclusion
The Crusades impacted history greatly. Despite negative views on Muslims, Muslim technology further advanced Europe and set into motion the foundations of Globalization. The Crusades put the Middle East on the map of all Europeans and through the centuries of conflict in the area, trade was set up to keep a flow of exotic goods into Europe. These trade routes were the beginnings of Globalization on an economic scale, while the influx of Muslim ideas and technology into Europe, and European culture and tactics spread into the Middle East demonstrate Globalization of cultures across boundaries.
[1] Nicholson, Helen
The Crusades (Westport: Greenwood Press, 2004) 21
[2] Nicholson,
The Crusades 93
[3] Mossa, Matti “The Crusades: An Eastern Perspective, With Emphasis on Syriac Sources”
Muslim World 93, no. 3 (2003): 249
[4] Mossa, Matti “The Crusades: An Eastern Perspective, With Emphasis on Syriac Sources”
Muslim World 93, no. 3 (2003): 249
[5] Madden, Thomas F.
The Crusades (London: Blackwell Publishers Ltd., 2002) 213
[6] Richard, Jean
The Crusades c. 1071 – c. 1291(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999) 172
[7] Mastnak, Tomaz
Crusading Peace (Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2002) 93
[8] Asbridge, Thomas
The First Crusade: A New History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004) 2
[9] Asbridge,
The First Crusade: A New History 2
[10] Asbridge,
The First Crusade: A New History 2
[11] Partner, Peter
God of Battles (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997) 91
[12] Partner,
God of Battles 90
[13] Mastnak,
Crusading Peace 99
[14] Mastnak,
Crusading Peace 108
[15] Mastnak,
Crusading Peace 117
[16] Thomas, David “Changing Attitudes of Arab Christians towards Islam”
Transformation;22, no. 1 (2005): 10-19
[17] Thomas, David “Changing Attitudes of Arab Christians towards Islam”
Transformation;22, no. 1 (2005): 10-19
[18] Johnson, Daniel “How to think about the Crusades”
Commentary 120, no. 1 (2005): 46-51
[19] Joinville, Jean
The Life of Saint Louis trans. Shaw, M. R. B. (New York: Dorset Press, 1985) 203
[20] Joinville,
The Life of Saint Louis 204
[21] Joinville,
The Life of Saint Louis 227
[22] Joinville,
The Life of Saint Louis 227
[23] Joinville,
The Life of Saint Louis 227
[24] Joinville,
The Life of Saint Louis 228
[25] Joinville,
The Life of Saint Louis 279
[26] Joinville,
The Life of Saint Louis 279
[27] Joinville,
The Life of Saint Louis 286
[28] Joinville,
The Life of Saint Louis 286
[29] Joinville,
The Life of Saint Louis
[30] Riley-Smith, Jonathan “Rethinking the Crusades”
First Things: A Monthly Journal of Religion & Public Life Issue 101 (2005) 20-23
[31] Partner,
God of Battles 135
[32] Nicholson,
The Crusades 96
[33] Linehan, Peter, ed, and Nelson, Janet L., ed,
The Medieval World (New York: Routledge, 2001) 12
[34] Nicholson,
The Crusades 95
[35] Nicholson,
The Crusades 97
[36] Nicholson,
The Crusades 97
Bibliography
Asbridge, Thomas
The First Crusade: A New History Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004
Daniel, Norman
Heroes and Saracens Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1984
Joinville, Jean
The Life of Saint Louis trans. Shaw, M. R. B. New York: Dorset Press, 1985
Kedar, Benjamin Z.
Crusade and Mission: European Approaches toward the Muslims Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984
Linehan, Peter, ed, and Nelson, Janet L., ed,
The Medieval World New York: Routledge, 2001
Madden, Thomas F.
The Crusades London: Blackwell Publishers Ltd., 2002
Mastnak, Tomaz
Crusading Peace Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2002
Nicholson, Helen
The Crusades Westport: Greenwood Press, 2004
O’Callaghan, Joseph F.
Reconquest and Crusade in medieval Spain University of Pennsylvania Press, 2003
Partner, Peter
God of Battles Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997
Qureshi, Emran
The New Crusades: Constructing the Muslim Enemy New York: Columbia University Press, 2003
Richard, Jean
The Crusades c. 1071 – c. 1291 Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999
Periodicals:
Johnson, Daniel “How to think about the Crusades”
Commentary 120, no. 1 (2005): 46-51
Mossa, Matti “The
Crusades: An Eastern Perspective, With Emphasis on Syriac Sources”
Muslim World 93, no. 3 (2003): 249
Riley-Smith, Jonathan “Rethinking the Crusades”
First Things: A Monthly Journal of Religion & Public Life Issue 101 (2005) 20-23
Thomas, David “Changing Attitudes of Arab Christians towards Islam”
Transformation; 22, no. 1 (2005): 10-19
Crusades = Globilization?
Re: Crusades = Globilization?
Sorry, paid a return visit to my old jazz club haunt in Edinburgh at the weekend. 
