Posts Tagged ‘Medieval Europe’
Prince Henry, the So-Called Navigator
I’ve been thinking about Prince Henry the Navigator of Portugal today, and re-reading bits of Peter Russell’s excellent biography, Prince Henry “the Navigator”: A Life You remember Prince Henry. He’s the first in a series of names that you learned in grade school: Prince Henry the Navigator, Columbus, Dias, Magellan–maybe Henry Hudson if your teacher…
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The Fourth Crusade Takes a Detour
At first the Fourth Crusade looked like all the other Crusades. In 1198, Pope Innocent III called for Christian knights to sail to the Holy Lands and re-capture Jerusalem, which Saladin had taken back from crusaders in 1187. In response to his call, thousands signed up, eager to fight Muslims in the Holy Lands and…
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A Crusade by Any Other Name….
Sometimes the name you give to an historical event says a lot about where you stand in relation to that event. Is it the Civil War, or the War of Northern Aggression? The Sepoy Rebellion, the first Indian war of independence, or (my personal choice) the violence of 1857? Other times, what you call an…
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