First Crusade

The First Crusade is one of the best-known and most written-about events in history, but in this new book Dr Peter Frankopan asks vital questions that have never been posed before. This is the only book to address the history of the First Crusade from the perspective of the East, examining the role of the Byzantine Empire and its ruler, Emperor Alexios I Komnenos. 

From the schism between Rome and Constantinople to the rise of the T'ang Dynasty, from the birth of Muhammad to the crowning of Charlemagne, this erudite book tells the fascinating, often violent story of kings, generals, and the peoples they ruled.

Isaac Lestroud, admiral of the Exilium Space Fleet, has spent the last three years working with Ambassador Amelie Lestroud to build an alliance against the Rogue Matrices, AIs bent on converting every world into a paradise, regardless of whether anyone lives on it. As Isaac hunts the Rogue that destroyed one of their allies’ homeworlds, Amelie begins negotiations with a potential new ally that could tip the balance. 

Beginning in 1095 and culminating four bloody years later, the First Crusade represented a new kind of warfare: holy, unrestrained, and apocalyptic. In Armies of Heaven, medieval historian Jay Rubenstein tells the story of this cataclysmic event through the eyes of those who witnessed it, emphasizing the fundamental role that apocalyptic thought played in motivating the Crusaders.

In the second half of the tenth century, Byzantium embarked on a series of spectacular conquests. By the early eleventh century, the empire was the most powerful state in the Mediterranean. Yet this imperial project came to a crashing collapse fifty years later, when political disunity, fiscal mismanagement, and defeat at the hands of the Seljuks and the Normans brought an end to Byzantine hegemony. By 1081, Byzantium's very existence was threatened.

The notable German historian and monk Ekkehard of Aurach was also a crusader. He wrote a comprehensive world history text, but upon returning from a pilgrimage to Jerusalem in 1101, he rewrote his portion on the First Crusade. "On the Opening of the First Crusade" is an excerpt from his larger work on the war, titled Hierosolymita. Modern scholars of history hold his contributions in high respect for his meticulous attention to detail and broad scope.

When a crusader army of Western European Franks took Jerusalem by storm on July 15, 1099, it was one of the more unexpected conquests in history. Everything seemed to be against them for the previous three years of crusades right up to the final siege, yet they finally prevailed. And when they did, they massacred most if not all of the population before establishing a Christian realm in a region that had been taken over by the Muslims in 634 CE.

Spring, 1096. Europe’s princes march their armies toward the Holy Land. They are accompanied by tens of thousands of pilgrims, led by a fiery preacher Peter the Hermit. Their destination is Jerusalem, the holiest of all Christian cities. Their goal is to conquer the Muslim occupation. History will call them the First Crusade. Among the pilgrims is Oderic of Rheims, a Benedictine monk from Eastern France. He's devoted to the cause, but the Crusade will test every vow he swore to the Church. His poverty will be challenged by greed, his obedience tempted by blood lust.

Though Aaron Turner would be just as happy to oversee archaeological digs, there might still be a few people out to kill him. What his enemies don’t know is that Aaron really is the One God’s Chosen, called Bringer, known as Death, and he’s become righteously pissed off.

In the 1960s, British historian Jonathan Riley-Smith first began studying the knightly orders of the Middle Ages that formed after the First Crusade. By the late 1970s, he had begun writing books from a "revisionist" point of view, challenging the common belief that the Crusades were motivated by fanaticism, and were designed to plunder the Holy Lands. To an extent, Riley-Smith's 1986 book The First Crusade and the Idea of Crusading overturned this previously held view.

Of the many campaigns during the Middle Ages, few are as remarkable or seemingly impossible to win at the start as the First Crusade (1095-99), and the true crowning achievement of that crusade, which resulted in two centuries of Western European Christian states in the Middle East and the permanent firing of the European imagination, was the conquest of Jerusalem on July 15, 1099 after three weeks of siege.

De acordo com a historiografia ocidental, a Primeira Cruzada teria sido uma expedição militar e religiosa incitada pelo papa Urbano II com o intuito de liberar Jerusalém da crescente ameaça do Islã. O evento teria culminado em julho de 1099, quando da libertação da Terra Santa por milhares de cavaleiros da Europa Ocidental. Mas será que seu verdadeiro catalizador foi Roma?

After years of planning, the Lunar Free State is going to war, on a crusade to liberate the people of Tatanna from the evil Bugs. For Lorna Greenwood, this will be a trial by fire—her first mission with her own command, the Predator-class destroyer LFS Lynx. She’s looking to get some payback for her last trip there eight years ago, which didn’t end well.

Even at the age of nine, little Golda Meir was known for being a leader. As the president of the American Young Sisters Society, she organizes her friends to raise money to buy textbooks for immigrant classmates. A glimpse at the early life of Israel's first female prime minister, who was born in Russia and grew up in Milwaukee, this story is based on a true episode in the early life of Golda Meir.

Throughout the galaxy, the reclusive alien race known as The One are incapacitated by terror. On the planet Luddeccea, wolf-human hybrid Volka harbors a terrible secret...a secret that must explain her nightmares. Trapped on a luxurious asteroid, pleasure ‘bot 6T9 struggles to find purpose - until he receives a message from an Unidentified Caller. The worlds of The One, Volka, and 6T9 are about to collide. The galaxy will be shaken to its core. The starship is waking.

After 10,000 years of war, humanity has obtained its wish - crusading the Milky Way. My name was Argo Herrero. I'm now Lynx, my code of war. Planetary system after planetary system, we've slain all intelligent species once alive in our galaxy. All but one, the last intelligent species left to be purged by our ranks. What will become of us when we've purged the whole galaxy? I don't know, but I'm afraid of what we'll become, of what I've already become.

My name is Argo Herrero. I'm ready to enlist, sign the contract to serve for 10 years under the ally ranks. Enlisting is the only way to free myself from the hands of the totalitarians, to fight for freedom itself. The allies assure me citizenship and a decent salary after 10 years of service. The Megachine are strong. Undefeated. Unrivaled. They have wiped out the ally drone force and are moving in for the final blow. First they took Europe, then Asia. With the help of the Chavistas, they conquered Latin America.