Saladin : Hero Of Islam

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Saladin : Hero Of Islam

The extraordinary character and career of Saladin are the keys to understanding the Battle of Hattin, the fall of Jerusalem and the failure of the Third Crusade. He united warring Muslim lands, reconquered the bulk of Crusader states and faced Richard the Lion Heart, king of England, in one of the most famous confrontations in medieval. Geoffrey Hindley’s sympathetic and highly readable study of the life and times of this remarkable, many-sided man, who dominated the Middle East in his day, gives a fascinating insight into his achievements and into the Muslim world of his contemporaries.

The story of how Saladin rose swiftly to the heights of power in Egypt, Syria and Palestine through conquest, intrigue and opportunism makes compelling reading. As Geoffrey Hindley shows, Saladin’s exceptional gifts as a battlefields commander and a military organizer were allied to an intense singleness of purpose and a rare political skill. United under his leadership, the Muslims formed a force that the Crusaders couldn’t hope to resist. But the quality that makes Saladin stand out from the other leaders of his time is his reputation for chivalry and honourable dealing.

Saladin Hero of Islam The book’s inside flap reads that what we have before us is a sympathetic study of Saladin. In truth though what we do have is a steroid-driven sympathetic biography. That aside, Geoffrey Hindley standing is untouchable with his scholarship beyond reproach. Inclusive are four maps and fourteen illustrationsnotwithstanding a welcome glossarycementing its place as mandatory reading for those wishing to comprehend the life and times of a Hero of Islam. Flicking through the preceding one-hundred-and-eighty-eight pages to the epilogue, Hindley eruditely pens what is arguably uppermost on the minds of contemporariesin essence, parallels between then and now. But why the interest? Well, for two reasons. First, because of his association with this ancient and historic zone of conflict. Saladin has special interest for a modern writer (pp. xiii, 181). Second, as a British-based scholar recently held, we are pre-programmed to seek out parallels and correlations (this pedagogic practice is not restricted to a north-western European archipelago neitherfor PBS previously aired Empires Holy Warriors which opens with a sequence comparing Osama Bin Laden to Saladin and George W. Bush to Richard the Lionheart). When Saladin Hero of Islam was initially published (as Saladin A Biography) just over thirty years ago the obvious parallel to draw between the world of Saladin and the contemporary world was that between the Kingdom of Jerusalem

Greoffrey Hindley is a distinguished medieval historian who has written widely on many aspects of the period. He has made a special study of medieval warfare and of England in the Age of Caxton, Under Siege, Tourists, Travellers nd Pilgrims, The Book of Magna Carta and The Crusades. His most recent publication is A Brief History of the Anglo-Saxons.