Tyerman, God's War - A New History Of The Crusades

Abstract

     "Deus lo Vult!" or "God wills it!" was the call from Pope Urban II to all Christians to crusade to free the Holy Land from the clutches of Islam. God's War by Christopher Tyerman, a Lecturer of Medieval History at Hertford College and New College, University of Oxford, is an in-depth look into the events of the Crusades. His writing is thorough when it comes to covering the Crusades which span nearly two hundred years from beginning to end. The book is perhaps too thorough when referencing Crusade leaders and soldiers; this is trivia that the reader neither needs to know about nor should really care about. Introducing dozens and dozens of obscure soldiers slows down the book and does not encourage the reader to continue to learn and experience an important era of Western history. The Crusades covered every experience of the human condition, yet somehow Tyerman turns it into an insurance lecture full of charts, graphs, and political analyses sure to put even the most interested reader to sleep.