Stephen M.H. Lawrence wrote:

"m II" wrote:
| He don't know much history, do he? This is a crock..

Try to be more specific - do you actually have a factual
refutation, or are you just throwing **** against a wall to
see if it sticks? Seriously!


This is what I posted as a response. The 'Peter The Hermit' character in
the last listing was a real winner. There is NO resemblence between the
truth and what that propaganda attempt said.

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During the first crusade, a small group of knights who may have started
out with sincere piety came to believe that they were the instruments
of God's wrath here on earth. In 1096 after taking the town of Marat,
Radulph of Caen says that they engaged in cannibalism and ate those who
were killed in battle, both men, women and children. They then decided
to go directly on to Jerusalem with the rest of the army or not. In the
town of Antioch they killed people regardless of Christian, Muslim, or
Jew with no bias to age, sex or religion. With the firm belief that
they were under the direct leadership of God almighty, no atrocity was
too terrible for these fanatics to commit. After every engagement they
would return to camp with the heads of the Muslim dead on top of poles,
and sometimes making the captured carry the heads of their fellow soldiers.


http://www.umich.edu/~marcons/Crusad...y-article.html
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It is hard to think of anything good to say about the Crusades, so I am
not going to. We have already discovered that church history has its
sordid episodes, but the Crusades marked perhaps the lowest point of
all. They did take place, after all, during the “Dark Ages.”

The worst atrocity of the Crusades was the sack of Byzantium (1204),
where the Crusaders stopped for three days of destruction on their way
to Palestine. According to one historian, they were filled with a lust
for destruction. They rushed in a howling mob down the streets and
through the houses, snatching up everything that glittered and
destroying whatever they could not carry, pausing only to murder or to
rape. . . . Wounded women and children lay dying in the streets. For
three days the ghastly scenes of pillage and bloodshed continued, till
the huge and beautiful city was a shambles [Steven Runciman, A History
of the Crusades, 3 vols. (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1954),
3:123].

Since Byzantium was the home of the Eastern church, its destruction
made permanent the breach between East and West which we discussed last
month.

http://www.tenth.org/wowdir/wow1999-02-21.html
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In many ways, the Crusades are Medieval Europe's "Lost Weekend,"
resembling nothing so much as a drunken binge from which one wakes up
having only vague memories of what happened, and with whom. So, in the
end, the issue which stands at the forefront here is not so much their
consequences or place in history as why they happened, the powerful
cocktail of religious zealotry, overpopulation, ignorance and bigotry
which westerners eagerly downed, only to come to their senses in a
century or so and realize what havoc they'd wrought. In many ways, we
still live with their hangover.

http://www.usu.edu/markdamen/1320/chapters/15CRUSAD.htm
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They were a bloody and brutal affair and included many aspects of what
later came to be called colonization. While, initially, Muslims tended
to obey conventions of war rigorously, and despite constant atrocity by
Europeans (including in particular the horrific taking of Jerusalem in
the First Crusade), held to a prohibition against harming civilians and
noncombatants. When retaking Jerusalem, no retributions or revenges of
any kind were committed, and a strict point was made of respect for the
Christian faith. Despite these good examples however, atrocities
continued, and over time the behavior of the Muslims tended to get
worse, and of Christians better - possibly either the result of
regression towards the mean or simply the fact that in the early days,
it was elite educated Muslims and poorer "adventuring" Christians that
tended to command. Over time, the Crusader States became established,
and more respectable Europeans arrived, while Muslims became more
desperate to expel them. This was eventually done by the time of the
Ottoman Empire.

http://www.disinfopedia.org/wiki.pht...&printable=yes
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The initial force was led by the "unwashed priest" Peter the Hermit
(c1050-1115). His "army" consisted mainly of French and German
peasants, drawn to the cause by the pope's promise of indulgences. [a]
This, they take to mean the freedom to commit any sin they like. They
lost no time in taking advantage of these indulgences. On their way
through Europe to the holy land, they massacred, tortured and plundered
any Jew they could find. [b] They stole and robbed whenever they felt
like it. For those places who tried to defend themselves against this
pillage, Peter's answer was war. In one such battle in Yugoslavia, the
crusaders slaughtered 4,000 of the local residents who dared to fight back.

Many of Peter's men died before they even reach Asia. Many more were
sold as slaves to pay for food for the rest. In the end only seven
thousand managed to reach Asiatic soil. When they finally encountered
the Turks in Nicaea, the ensuing battle was a mismatch. The Christian
army was routed. About four thousand of them were killed in the battle.
All in all, a total of 300,000 Christians died during this march led by
Peter the Hermit. [5]

http://www.geocities.com/paulntobin/crusades.html
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