¶ … Treasure of Montsegur
The novel The Treasure of Montsegur by Sophy Burnam (Harper/San Francisco, 2003), set in France in the year 1252, uses as its setting and historical backdrop the atmosphere of southern France during the 13th Roman Catholic Crusade led by Pope Innocent III, against a Christian sect of southern France, the Cathars. A Cathar woman, Jeanne of Beziers, is the main character. Historically speaking, Catharism:
was a religious movement with Gnostic elements that originated around the middle of the 10th century, branded by the contemporary Roman Catholic
Church as heretical. It existed throughout much of Western Europe, but its home was in Languedoc and surrounding areas in southern France.
("Cathar")
According to Wikipedia, not much is known about daily lives of the medieval Catharists, or about their specific religious or moral practices. However, "What is certain is that they formed an anti-sacerdotal party in opposition to the Catholic Church, and raised a continued protest against perceived corruption of the clergy" (Wikipedia).
The Treasure of Montsegur vividly depicts how medieval religious conflict and religious warfare combine to impact individual characters' lives and destinies, and the life and destiny of one fictional woman in particular, Jeanne of Beziers.
Jeanne, whose first words to the reader are "hey say I am mad . . . I have seen enough to drive anyone mad" (p. 1) is found as a baby by Cathar survivors of the latest Catholic massacre against them. In Moses-like fashion, Jeanne is then adopted and raised by them as one of their own. Under the thoughtful, meditative guidance of Lady Esclarmonde (whose name translates...
The Battle of Hattin, as it has come to be known, was a very decisive event in the history of the Crusades. After destroying the Christian army, Saladin and his Muslim brothers quickly conquered almost every Frankish city and on October 2, 1187, the Holy City of Jerusalem fell which signaled the beginning of the Third Crusade, "a reaction to the fall of the Holy City of Jerusalem to the
The Second Crusade, 1147-1149, was led by Louis 7th of France and the Holy Roman Emperor and proved to be a failure (Crusades 1 pp). The purpose of the Third Crusade, 1189-1192, was to reclaim Jerusalem, which had been lost in 1187 to Saladin, the Islamic army's greatest general (Crusades 1 pp). This effort was undermined by the personal rivalry between Philip II of France and Richard I of England
One thing not even Madden can excuse is that cultural and social exchanges between Christians did not lead to compassion towards members of other faiths, particularly Jews. In fact, the crusading impulse invariably, more so with every successive crusade, brought examples of the persecution of Jews in the region. The first crusade almost immediately spawned mass killings of Jews down the Rhine en route to Jerusalem, supposedly because Jews' wealth
Crusades The First Crusade took place from 1096 -- 1099. The First Crusade was a great surprise to both the Christians and the Muslims, the two opposing parties of the Crusades. The victory of the First Crusade went to the Christians. The Crusades were a series of nine wars waged during the Middle Ages between Christians and Muslims. The wars were waged between the 11th and 13th centuries specifically. In 1071, the
Crusades An overview of the book, specifically its focus on the bloody aftermath of the Fourth Crusade to take Jerusalem, as chronicled and assembled by Regine Pernoud in pages 201-216 of his text The text The Crusades by Regine Pernoud presents, in its overview of the events, two contemporary chronicled versions of the pivotal events that took place in the aftermath of the Fourth Crusade to take Jerusalem by the Christian world.
He successfully asked the Christian countrymen to volunteer as penance. (4) in a period of flux the faith of the church became a unifying force, where one was greatly needed and men of arms swore allegence to the church and followed many calls for piece within France and other nations, especially freedom from violence against the poor and the faithful. (5) Riley-Smith also makes clear that the conditions of Islam
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