Customer Reviews

The First Crusade (Canto)

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This Canto abridged version gives in nearly 200 pages a good account of the motives of the "west" to start the crusades, the reasons why the Byzantines agreed, the very indivual human motives of the kings, popes, clergyman, nobles, and poor. It also spells out what it takes to get (mostly on foot) from France to Jerusalem, with a large mass of poorly prepared people. A fascinating account.

If you have romantic ideas about the crusades they will have been replaced by solid facts out of the everydays crusaders lives at the end of this book. You'll have a better grasp of this era as a whole, and the place of the crusades in it.

Sometimes there are more scholary details offered then I really need in an abridged version. But it still is a good read, that offers you the flavor, the look and feel, of the past.

This abridgement couples Runciman's well narrated and concise account of the First Crusade with some beautiful illustrations of the Holy Land, medieval warfare, and Byzantine, Latin, and Muslim art. It is a shame, however, that amongst all these wonderful illustrations, there is not one detailed map of the Holy Land and Asia Minor. Still, the book is well worth having and reading. If you haven't already read the unabridged edition you may want to read that as well.

Steven Runciman is well noted for his three-volume 'History of the Crusades' published in 1951. This paperback edition is an abridged excerpt of that work that focuses on specifically the First Crusade.

This is a much 'romanticized' narration of the First Crusades, as Mr. Runciman is well known for inscribing his passion for this event into his work. But do not let that stop you from reading this account. Mr. Runciman has added detail to this volume using quotes from actual chroniclers of the time to build and augment his story.

This abridged paperback gives you contemporary descriptions of the political climate, the backgrounds of the main players, overviews of many of the campaigns and battles of the event and weaves it all into an interesting story filled with zealots, nobility, passion, intrigue and fire. Reading this you can easily get swept into the spiritual fervor and single minded determination that these people must have had.

You also feel the impact of the battles and massacres in his descriptions of the sieges and taking of the various cities. Mr. Runciman does a very good job of making sure the reader becomes involved in the details of events as the Crusaders storm through the Holy Land to the city of Jerusalem.

There is no bibliography in the volume I have nor are there any pictures or maps. The 'Introductory Note' states 'The book is published without reference notes nor a bibliography. If readers wish to consult the sources, primary and secondary, on which my account is based, may I refer them to the original work, in which a full apparatus criticus is provided? A recent edition is still in print.'

For a very well written and passionate account of the First Crusade this book will provide a good read as well as an historical overview of the event.
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The First Crusade comes alive in this small book by S. Runciman. (It is apparently an extract from his much longer history of the Crusades.) This is a great work that offers the "high points" of the late 11th century epic between West and East.

Runciman's writing style is very readable. The book may be read in a short time. He tells the Crusade's story chronologically using considerable topical details. (There is no sourcing in the book which keeps it from attaining the 5th star.)

If you want the main characters' names, the dates, and places that made Crusade history, Runciman has them. This book inspired further reading about the Templars and Hospitalers.

This book is a must read for Crusade reader and those interested in Mid Eastern history. It also speaks to early Christian-Muslim military action.

The book is recommendable.

Had I read carefully the other reviews I would have been aware of the abridgement before I purchased this version. For many this will be fine, but the introduction has been severely cut and all of the critical apparatus, including the bibliography is absent. The original is a classic. This a butchered classic.

A nicely produced reprint of the first volume of Runciman's famous series on the Crusades. Runciman was an excellent writer and as a narrative account, this book is hard to beat. Clearly and concisely written with a nice eye for telling vignettes and character summaries. A good complement to this book is the opening section of Thomas Asbridge's book on this topic. Asbridge has a nice explanation of the European politics that led to the First Crusade and the psychology of the Crusaders. Essentially all books on this topic suffer from the fact that the primary sources are largely european, so accounts of the First Crusade are very much accounts of the progress, politics, and personalities of the Crusaders. Runciman, like other historians, stresses the crucial role of the Byzantine Emperor Alexius Comnenus, and the relative weakness of the Muslim states in the Near East. The absence of maps in this edition is a drawback.

For those interested in secondary readings on the Crusades without the hassle of searching for books by Anna Comnena or William of Tyre, this book is for you. Runciman, a Cambridge professor, does an excellent job of ploughing through the facts and inconsistencies of William of Tyre, Anna Comnena, and other historians of that time period! I highly recommend you reading the other 2 volumes as well!

I bought this via Kindle for under $10....Mr Runciman gives an excellent account of the events leading up to the First Crusade and the actual operations and tactics userd by the Crusaders in the Holy Land. He also discusses the behind the scene dealings that were involved in developing and holding together the Coalition between Rome and Constantinople. It also shreds the "conventional wisdom" that the Crusades were wars of aggression by European Christians. Really well written.

For an expert or someone not well-versed in the Crusades, there might not be a better resource than Steven Runciman's three-volume history of the Crusades.

Volume one relates the origins of the Crusades, and Runciman also provides very interesting overview of Christian history in the process of describing the relationship of the Church in the east to Muslims and Jews. In doing so, the reader is impressed by the complexity of relations between the three major faiths that lay claim to the Holy Land, and how the complexity of these relations is not a new phenomenon. If anything, Volume One suggests that, freed from outside pressures, the "people of the book" can coexist.

Runciman also conveys the human dynamic aspect of the early Crusades that might be lost. The relationships between the hermits and clergy that spawned the first crusade, the competition (of sorts) between the Frankish and German lords, their confrontations with Byzantine authorities (both ecclesiastical and secular) and those of the Middle East were the real drivers of the Crusades. In understanding how these human interactions developed and played out, the reader can better trace the ebb and flow of the cause-effect of actions and reactions that shaped the Crusades.

If you are still ignorant enough to believe the Crusades were a manifestation of Christian aggression, then this book might be more up your alley than that of true, dispassionate historians.

The Crusades were not, by any means, a war of Christian aggression -- quite the contrary, they were carried out as a defensive (not offensive!) measure to combat Islamic aggression (let's not forget that Spain had already been swept over by Islamic aggression by the time of the First Crusade and now the Seljuk Turks were violently spreading and conquering, leading Alexius I, the Byzantine emperor, to ask the Pope in the West for help against this violent wave of Islamic aggression.) In the past 20 years, serious scholars/historians have come to this conclusion (that the Crusades have been inaccurately labeled as a war of aggression when they were in fact a defensive measure). And to think that I was taught in school that the aim of the Christians in the Crusades was to convert others and was taught nothing of the Islamic aggression of the time that directly led to (and justified!) the campaigns -- ridiculous!!

Unfortunately, due to a bizarre self-loathing, self-critical streak found only in Western Europe (starting in the Enlightenment) and America -- i.e., the left -- many scholars have consistently villified, and/or apologized for, the Crusades, wrongly sneering that these campaigns were driven by a motive for booty and territory. Gee, are these historians demanding similar apologies for the violent spread of Islam in medieval Spain?? Back to my point, though: how the typical Crusader's selling off all of his possessions, to trek halfway across the world to a hot dessert region where the chance of surviving is about 2%, can be motivated by greed is beyond me...

In actuality, the Crusades were motivated simply by a sincere belief in the need to halt Islamic aggression and make the area safe for Christian pilgrims and Christian inhabitants, as well as a belief that sacrificing for the glory of Christianity would earn forgiveness of sins. Sure, the Crusaders conquered cities and towns -- but isn't that to expected in a military campaign??? Why are the Crusades singled out for achieving what every other successful military campaign achieves?

The previous view of the Crusaders as bullies who cruelly sought to kill and take over land in some far-off desert region is a joke -- if anyone is to deserve the description of aggression-motivated-by-ambition-for-land-and-riches, it is the Muslims of the time.

I highly recommend Jonathan Riley-Smith's works on the Crusades. He is the foremost authority on the subject and his work is not biased one way or the other (doesn't villify either side). Steven Runciman is outdated and incorrect. If one is interested in the Templars, I recommend Piers Paul Read's excellent, definitive work. Lastly, stay away from that laughable "Hollywood history" of the Crusades (2005's Kingdom of Heaven) where Christian = wrong.