The Crusades Through Arab Eyes (Saqi Essentials)

In-store location: Shelf 4.19

By Amin Maalouf,  Schocken Books Inc, Paperback, 320 pages

European and Arab versions of the Crusaders have little common. What the West remembers as an epic effort to reconquer the Holy Land is portrayed here as a brutal, destructive, unprovoked invasion by barbarian hordes. When, under Saladian, a powerful Muslin army-inspired by prophets and poets-defeated the Crusaders, it was greatest victory ever won by a non-European society against the West.

Table of Contents:
Prologue

Part One: Invasion (1096-1100)
1. The Franj Arrive
2. An Accursed Maker of Armour
3. The Cannibals of Ma'arra

 Part Two: Occupation (1100-1128)
4. Tripoli's Two Thousand Days
5. Turban-Clad Resistance

 Part Three: Riposte (1128-1146)
6. The Damascus Conspiracies
7. An Emir Among Barbarians

 Part Four: Victory (1146-1187)
8. Nur al-Din, the Saint-King
9. The Rush for the Nile
10. The Tears of Saladin

 Part Five: Reprieve (1187-1244)
11. The Impossible Encounter
12. The Perfect and the Just

 Part Six: Expulsion (1244-1291)
13. The Mongol Scourge
14. God Grant That They Never Set Foot There Again!

 Epilogue
Chronology
Glossary

About the author:

Amin Maalouf  was director of the weekly international edition of the leading Beirut daily an-Nahar, and was also editor-on-chief of Jeune Afrique