The Third Crusade 1191: Richard the Lionheart, Saladin and the Struggle for Jerusalem (Campaign): 161

This is a reasonably good Osprey title on the Third Crusade, the one that saw two kings (Richard the Lionheart and Philippe Augustus) and one Emperor (Frederic Barbarossa) set of with their respective armies to attempt to reconquer the Holy Land and Jerusalem in particular. Contrary to the front page title, however, the events included range from 1187 and the aftermath of the disastrous defeat of Hattin right up to September 1192 when Richard sailed back to Europe and effectively ended the Crusade (so, not only 1191).The text itself has the usual sections that can be found in an Osprey Campaign title, except that in reality there was more than one campaign. Acre was besieged by the Crusaders for nearly two years, starting in August 1189, with the French and English Kings only arriving in late May and early June of 1191, the city of Acre surrendering in July. The French King, who played a larger role in the siege that what is generally acknowledged, departed almost immediately afterwards, leaving Richard to conduct the following campaigns of 1191 and 1192 as supreme commander.The narrative of the campaigns and the presentation of the context contains the main elements, although there are glitches and omissions, some of the latter being probably attributable to the limited space that was available. Saladin did simply not enjoy the same good relations with the Byzantines that the Fatimides of Egypt had. In fact, prior to his death in 1180, the Emperor Manuel send his fleet twice to participate alongside the Franks in attacks on Egypt. Also, the need to summarise the main events affecting the French, Anglo-French and German armies and their voyage to the Holy Land has lead the author to cut out most of the events – and the numerous battles before Acre and assaults against the city – that took place before the arrival of the Kings.Also problematic is the narrative surrounding the execution by Richard of Saladin’s garrison of some 2600 after it decided to surrender of Acre. The reasons for such a dramatic step (by modern standards) and for the failure of the negotiations with Saladin to ransom them are omitted. Saladin had assembled a hundred thousand dinars (and not ten thousand!) along with the 1600 Christian captives that he was holding but this was only half of the sum that Richard was asking for. Also missing is an analysing explaining why the fall of Acre mattered so much and was in fact the main event of the whole Crusade. It was a much more important one than Richard’s victory at Arsuf, however well described the later may be. It was also the event that made it possible for the Crusaders to reconquer the coast since almost all of Saladin’s navy was trapped in Acre when the city surrendered. In fact, the naval dimension of the siege of Acre is almost entirely missing although it was a crucial element explaining the initial lack of success of the Crusaders, unable to initially blockade the city from the sea. Once they became able to do so and having trapped most of Saladin’s navy within the port of Acre, the city was doomed unless the Crusaders could be decisively defeated on land, which is something that Saladin never managed.While there are some limited explanations on Saladin’s difficulties and failures, including his ill health, much more could have been included and these omissions result in a lack of context. Essentially, Saladin had trouble controlling the various contingents and warlords that made up his army. Moreover, these had been campaigning since 1187 and the Sultan’s treasury was depleted, as evidenced by his failure to gather the ransom for his elite troops captured at Acre. In other words, Saladin’s failure to break the siege of Acre and the long war of attrition that followed and ended with the surrender of the city left him with depleted troops who morale must have been rather low.While the Franks discipline during their march down the coast was certainly a major factor of their success, their total mastery of the sea, allowing them to be regularly provisioned, was another and the lack of success and low morale of the Muslims was a third. It is therefore a bit of a pity that the author choose to only concentrate upon the first element.Finally, I did not much like Christa Hook’s somewhat “impressionist” illustration and could not help finding the various maps somewhat over-complicated and therefore not as clear as they could have been.For those wanting more on all of these omitted pieces, I can recommend the recently published book by Hosler “The Siege of Acre, 1189-1191: Saladin, Richard the Lionheart, and the Battle That Decided the Third Crusade All of these”.Three (somewhat generous) stars

This is a really good book about the Third Crusade and I recommand it warmly for the introductory reading.Descriptions of the siege of Accre and of the battle of Arsuf are clear and interesting. The well known anti-Christian and pro-Muslim bias of David Nicolle is here very much under control. In fact I was pleasantly surprised by the effort of objectivity, especially considering that the cruel treatment of Muslim prisoners by Richard Lionheart could actually justify some crusader bashing. Nevertheless, the author couldn't resist to place a very demeaning comment, writing that for the Muslims the Western women were "considered pretty useless for anything". I confess being deeply shocked by that sentence.This book has however two weak spots. The maps, usually good in David Nicolle books, are too complicated, to the point of being impossible to uderstand. However, the really bad point are the horrible colour plates by Christa Hook. Hardly any details are available, the dominating shade is dirty gray and the faces of the fighters are hardly human - it is possibly good modern art, but these illustrations are useless to military history passionates.

It looks interesting but have not started reading it yet.

Dr. Nicolle shines once again with his intimate knowledge of subject.But he seems to be jumping on the Osprey boat to rip off customers by divulging his knowledge more sparingly in this book.Mainly deals with the battle of Arsuf.Of 92 pages 40 are devoted to Arsuf.Usual waffling introduction wasting space.One map had over 50 sidelines to read...repeated nearly as shortly in the text itself. Seems they didn't know what to write on this one and the maps where so clustered it put one off even attempting to read them.Christa Hook got her foot in the project once again and supplied three of her obnoxious plates. The plates are so lousy that even she couldn't find anything to write for plate commentary...1/3 of page left blank!What am I paying for here??!Makes one laugh...and Osprey keep on selling her as a wanted artist!Not by any serious Osprey collector.Book is overpriced and a waste of hard earned money. Dont buy!