Lionhearts: Richard 1, Saladin, and the Era of the Third Crusade

When the Muslims captured Jerusalem in 1187, Christian rulers across Europe responded to the call. While they raised funds and mustered armies, priests preached that killing "infidels" was morally proper and that crusaders would be guaranteed a place in heaven. Lionhearts is the story of the Third Crusade (1189 to 1192), which sent thousands of men into a holy war. Geoffrey Regan details the day-to-day life of the common crusader--long sieges, marches through swamps, lost supplies, and occasional fierce battles--and the political squabbles between leaders sworn to fight together. Though Regan is a fine military historian, Lionhearts is, at its center, really a rose-colored dual biography of the Third Crusade's two main antagonists: Richard the Lionhearted and Saladin. Alternating chapters focus on each leader's rise to power, noting similarities between them. Regan is clearly enamored of his subjects, and spends a great deal of time enumerating their noble qualities. This is all well and good (and common in biography), but it's difficult to stomach Regan's description of Richard's massacre of 3,000 Muslim prisoners after the siege of Acre as an action "requiring the greatest moral courage."

Regan is a skillful writer, and his pages are peppered with vivid odds and ends: pious crusaders operating "God's own catapult"; Saladin sending a gift of snow and fruit to Richard I, preparing to besiege Acre; small rodents called jerboas leaping up and alarming the crusaders. With its maps, concise chronology, modern photographs, and handy list of the main personalities, Lionhearts is an excellent introduction to the history of the Third Crusade. --Sunny Delaney