On 2007-02-10 Maciej K., Belgium wrote: Being very familliar with the many previous books by David Nicolle I was a little bit apprehensive beginning to read this one, because of his well known anti-Christian and pro-Muslim bias present in many of his older works. Well, all in all I was favorably surprised, because there is a clear effort of objectivity from his part on this still hotly debated topic. This is a very honest overview of the First Crusade, although, by necessity, quite short (Osprey Campaigns series are alway only 96 pages long). Certainly one can be a little surprised by the frequency with which author names the Crusaders army ´a horde´, and qualifies their commitment as ´fanatism´ and ´hysterical religious intoxication´. But I expected much worse.
Maps are very well done - this is a strong point in all David Nicolle books.
The really BAD point are the colour plates, the trademark of Osprey series - in this book they are simply horrible. Very vague, gray, without details usually present in most of the Osprey titles, with the faces of people almost fading. All in all these plates by Christa Hook belong more in a modern art museum than in a military history book.
Nevertheless it is still a honest book. . And summed up by saying Honest book, very bad illustrations. Currently The First Crusade 1096-99: Conquest of the Holy Land (Campaign) has an overall rating of 6 over 10.
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Christa Hook claimed In 1095 the Byzantine Emperor Alexios I appealed to the Christian states of western Europe for help against the Turks who had swept across the Empire after the disastrous Byzantine defeat at Manzikert in 1071. This book is about the First Crusade that followed, and saw several armies of ‘armed pilgrims’ march across Europe to the Holy Land. They were unleashed on a divided and fragmented Islamic world and won a series of apparently miraculous victories, capturing the Holy City of Jerusalem itself. The success of the First Crusade was never to be repeated, however, and triggered two centuries of bitter warfare, the repercussions of which are still felt today.
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