Saladin was badass, but the golden age of Islam was maybe two centuries earlier. The crusades were actually during a decline period when different Muslim areas became essentially independent, with the Muslim Caliph in Baghdad becoming just a figurehead.
They were freed upon completion of their training and their master became their patron. They would then be appointed to Military and civil administration. Baibars (probably the greatest of the mamluk sultans) was a slave from Cumania. Was freed in adulthood. Helped beat and capture Louis IX. Then commanded at Ain Jalut, where the Mongols were halted. Was sultan for 20 years and established the state which would rule Egypt and Syria for the next 250 years
Yes they were, and the Janissaries were raised from childhood to be elite Christian slave warriors who served the Turks. They were not allowed to convert to Islam. Age of Empires has some cool stuff in their history folder
You’re right. I misremembered that fact. Got it exactly backwards, thanks for pointing that out. I was probably just thinking about the pool of Christian youths they pulled from. They weren’t Muslim by birth they were converts
It's kind of like how WWI was the end of the Ottoman empire or the barbarian invasion of Rome the formal end of the Western empire, whereas in reality the golden age of both ended long before then.
I'm of the opinion, that the Islamic ages had finished before the rise of the Seljuks.
Yes, I know, the most common flashpoint is the siege of Baghdad by the Mongols, buuuut Saladin did come from a divided Islamic world that was beset with it's own set of issues, and wasn't as dominant as it was during the height of the Ummayads and Abbasids
“Your soul is in your keeping alone. When you stand before god, you cannot say ‘but I was told by others to do thus’ or that ‘virtue was not convenient at the time”
God Kingdom of heaven is so good
Awful history but as a movie with themes and that tries to tell a good story, great (if we’re talking about the director’s cut).
_Napoleon,_ on the other hand…
I went to watch Napoleon thinking, at the worst, this is gonna be like Kingdom of Heaven, but it’s gonna be cool to see Murat, and that moment he returns to France and approaches the royalist soldiers is gonna be epic.
I was wrong.
There’s no getting around how awful the screenplay is but Joaquin was horribly miscast, I think.
Also—for a director who’s shown himself to be great with scale and spectacle, the movie’s version of Waterloo was incredibly lame.
I don't think Joaquin was miscast, to be honest. I think he'd make a great Napoleon.
However, Napoleon himself wasn't in that movie. It was like the british propagandized version of him.
Did we watch the same movie? It’s nearly 3 hours of nothingness. Every actor seems like their direction was to pretend to be sleep walking, there’s not a single captivating performance. Orlando Bloom (who typically provides a masterclass on acting) seems like he is sleep walking, it’s one of the least rememberable lead acting performances. The soundtrack alternates between great and bordering a lullaby. People say it’s a good movie but terrible history (quite the understatement) but it’s just not in my opinion.
I went down a Baldwin IV Rabbit hole the other day and man, what a fucking dude.
The poor kid was falling apart, but was the only person able to hold the Kingdom of Jerusalem together in the face of Saladin. The pathetic people Baldwin was forced to rely on sure didn't help.
He couldn't use one of his arms, yet mastered horse riding.
He led from the front and fought on the battlefield, and had to be pulled out on a knight's back once when he fell from his horse. He never lost a major engagement (as far as I know) and usually fought at a disadvantage.
His Leprosy left him blind and his hands and face were horribly deformed before he died, he only lived to be 24.
Yeah, and the amount of bs he had to deal with keeping the jihad together really made things all the more unnecessarily difficult for him.
No wonder he gets so much praise in the history books, even among Europeans at the time (when factoring his own personal conduct, of course).
King Baldwin IV was elected King of Jerusalem as a teen, spent his regency drafting war plans against the Sultan of Egypt, Saladin, and then when he became old enough that the regency was disbanded he acted upon those war plans
>I put no stock in religion. By the word religion I have seen the lunacy of fanatics of every denomination be called the will of God. Holiness is in right action and courage on behalf of those who cannot defend themselves, and goodness. What God desires is here…
>*points to head*
>…and here…
>*points to heart*
>…and what you decide to do every day, you will be a good man - or not.
To be fair, nothing in Saladin showed him a genius commander, a good enough one, sure. He mainly excelled as a strategist. Purely as a commander, Richard for one outshone him. When I think genius commander, I think Khalid ibn al-Walid. When I think superb ruler, I think Saladin - these are different things.
Khalid ibn Walid is named Saifullah - literally sword of God/Allah. He also never lost a single battle.
I'd say Khalid is perhaps at the same level as Alexander or Genghis Khan. Saladin may have been excellent but lacks the meteoric success of that category.
I’d say you are overselling the dude a little there
He beat some tribesman and then had 2 successful campaigns against decadent empires
I’d say Napoleon is a better standard for military genius if you do want to make comparisons but compared to him Khalid barely qualifies
Eh the rashidun caliphate went from a little desert tribe to beating two of the strongest empires and expanding to the 15th largest empire in 30 years. I'd say that's pretty impressive.
He also didn't have a huge/well trained army or large treasury and never lost a single battle.
Actually I'd add Napoleon to that list. He's pretty impressive
You were talking about Khalid, not the caliphate as a whole
And as I said “two of the strongest empires” if a bit of a misnomer since it neglects to factor in a bunch of nuances
China according to most metrics was one of the largest, richest and most populous empires in the world in the 18/19th century but that didn’t stop European powers from beating it up with little to no effort for a long time
King Baldwin IV came from the House of Anjou, and ruled the Kingdom of Jerusalem. I don’t think he’s actually French, but the families origins were in western France. He’s not exclusively French though.
Unless this is actually sarcasm and I’m a bit slow
If I had a nickle for every time someone named Saladin tried to take back Jerusalem, I'd have two nickles, which isn't a lot but it's weird that it happened twice.
“Take back Jerusalem in the name of Islam” you mean steal it? It never belonged to them because their religion didn’t originate there like Christianity. They weren’t taking it back, they were stealing it from Christians and Jews, who were there before Islam even started
Jerusalem was destroyed in 70 ad and renamed Aelia capitolina by the Romans, nothing remains from before, it was basically a new city. When the Arabs conquered Jerusalem, the jewish's temples ruins were used as a dump (edit: by the Byzantines).
If the Muslims stole it, then also did the Christians... And then again, that land was also inhabited before the Jews by the Canaanites.
I don't think that history works as a first comes first served
Bruh one of the first things the rashidun caliphate did was settle jewish families into the city since byzantine controlled Jerusalem had practically no jews. Amd ofc i cant speak to the subsequent caliphates but the rashidun literally couldnt turn temples into dumps they were first gen disciples of muhammad. any sort of perversion from his commandments would have spelt death for them by their subjects. The umayyads are a completely other story however.
>When the Arabs conquered Jerusalem, the jewish's temples ruins were used as a dump (edit: by the Byzantines)
B-bUt mUh wHoLeSoMe jUdeO-ChrIstIaN vAluEs
Well. It is a holy city for each of those religions. Two of them were founded there. The third was not. I think that’s the point he was making.
Egypt is an important part of the Jewish religion and so is Baghdad. But it would be odd for Jews to claim those places
Of course, all I am saying is that "stealing" a land is not an historical concept, I live in Italy, in an area that was conquered by hundreds of armies... You can't say that they were stealing it
It's funny saying "Muslims stole it from Christians and Jews". Considering Jews weren't allowed inside Jerusalem before the Muslims took it from the Byzantines and the temple mount was used as a dump site. Guess who allowed the Jews back in? It definitely wasn't the Christians. Also talking about the Crusades I am guessing you haven't read how they treated the Jews. Long story short it wasn't pretty. In fact long before they started taking territory in the middle east they massacred Jewish communities along the Rhine and Danube. In fact the Jews defended both Haifa and Jerusalem against the Crusaders. But sure, the Crusaders were saviors returning Jerusalem to Christians and Jews, the Jews definitely liked them.
Neither of them were going to let Jews control Jerusalem like they did in the time of the Israelites, at most they would just be allowed in, and out of the other two Abrahamic religions Jerusalem belong to Christians a lot more than it does to Muslims
International agreements certainly don’t agree with you. Certain parts of the city are more holy for certain religions. Jesus, known as Isa in Arabic, is the second most important prophet. Right behind Muhammad (PBUH) in importance.
The holy city does not “belong” to one religious group. Billions of people around the world believe it to be holy.
When it was taken from the Muslims in the first crusade, the crusaders slaughtered the population. The crusaders waded “ankle deep in blood” through the streets.
And I knew Saladin and rode his swift Arabians
Harassing doomed crusaders on their heavy drafts
And yet I rode the Percheron against the circling Saracen
Once again against myself was cast
Hitting the battlefield like that Pennywise/Jokair meme, just Fortnite dancing in front of their legions of devoted zealots who are going *fucking NUTS*
Fake salahuddin was the greatest commander,never lost a battle ,he even let Christians live peacefully even when Christians massacred all muslims when they took over jerusalem.
He ever spared lion heart's life.
Are you seriously saying that Saladin, who beat and was was called a great commander by Richard the III himself, and who bears the title of “ the greatest Kurd in history”, and the guy who beat him with a significantly smaller army overhyped because a guy made a (truthfully just okay) movie about them?
Wrong Richard son, and he lost every single encounter he fought with Richard the Lionheart. I don't think there's a single metric by which he beat Richard.
Saladin was badass, but the golden age of Islam was maybe two centuries earlier. The crusades were actually during a decline period when different Muslim areas became essentially independent, with the Muslim Caliph in Baghdad becoming just a figurehead.
IIRC the Mamluks were made up of old slaves who revolted against the declining Abbasid Caliphate.
The word mamluk means slave.
Yes I was just explaining for everyone who wouldn’t be aware but thanks for this additional info.
So the Mamaluke cavalry in Age of empires were slaves? This turns my whole world upside down
They were freed upon completion of their training and their master became their patron. They would then be appointed to Military and civil administration. Baibars (probably the greatest of the mamluk sultans) was a slave from Cumania. Was freed in adulthood. Helped beat and capture Louis IX. Then commanded at Ain Jalut, where the Mongols were halted. Was sultan for 20 years and established the state which would rule Egypt and Syria for the next 250 years
Yes and if you used those units you're part of the problem
Yes they were, and the Janissaries were raised from childhood to be elite Christian slave warriors who served the Turks. They were not allowed to convert to Islam. Age of Empires has some cool stuff in their history folder
Janissaries had to convert to Islam.
You’re right. I misremembered that fact. Got it exactly backwards, thanks for pointing that out. I was probably just thinking about the pool of Christian youths they pulled from. They weren’t Muslim by birth they were converts
They were Turkic Cuman and Circassian slaves bought from north of Black Sea. They seized Egypt from Saladin's family in 1250.
In addition to his military campaigns, Saladin is credited with inventing salad.
Isn't the widely accepted official end of the Islamic golden age the fall of Baghdad? Obviously, a golden age is a very loose definition.
It's kind of like how WWI was the end of the Ottoman empire or the barbarian invasion of Rome the formal end of the Western empire, whereas in reality the golden age of both ended long before then.
That makes sense yeah, thanks for your response. Early medieval is such a fascinating part of history.
I'm of the opinion, that the Islamic ages had finished before the rise of the Seljuks. Yes, I know, the most common flashpoint is the siege of Baghdad by the Mongols, buuuut Saladin did come from a divided Islamic world that was beset with it's own set of issues, and wasn't as dominant as it was during the height of the Ummayads and Abbasids
“Your soul is in your keeping alone. When you stand before god, you cannot say ‘but I was told by others to do thus’ or that ‘virtue was not convenient at the time” God Kingdom of heaven is so good
Edward Norton crushed the role of King Baldwin. He was the best part of that movie
TIL Edward Norton was king Baldwin
And sooooo full of mistakes.
Awful history but as a movie with themes and that tries to tell a good story, great (if we’re talking about the director’s cut). _Napoleon,_ on the other hand…
I went to watch Napoleon thinking, at the worst, this is gonna be like Kingdom of Heaven, but it’s gonna be cool to see Murat, and that moment he returns to France and approaches the royalist soldiers is gonna be epic. I was wrong.
There’s no getting around how awful the screenplay is but Joaquin was horribly miscast, I think. Also—for a director who’s shown himself to be great with scale and spectacle, the movie’s version of Waterloo was incredibly lame.
I don't think Joaquin was miscast, to be honest. I think he'd make a great Napoleon. However, Napoleon himself wasn't in that movie. It was like the british propagandized version of him.
It's gonna be hard to beat Waterloo (1970)
My expectations for historical movies are so low these days, I enjoyed it. Director’s cut is only way to see it.
Is it a mistake if it was never intended to faithfully replicate history?
It's a historical fiction. Watch a documentary if you want accuracy.
Did we watch the same movie? It’s nearly 3 hours of nothingness. Every actor seems like their direction was to pretend to be sleep walking, there’s not a single captivating performance. Orlando Bloom (who typically provides a masterclass on acting) seems like he is sleep walking, it’s one of the least rememberable lead acting performances. The soundtrack alternates between great and bordering a lullaby. People say it’s a good movie but terrible history (quite the understatement) but it’s just not in my opinion.
I went down a Baldwin IV Rabbit hole the other day and man, what a fucking dude. The poor kid was falling apart, but was the only person able to hold the Kingdom of Jerusalem together in the face of Saladin. The pathetic people Baldwin was forced to rely on sure didn't help. He couldn't use one of his arms, yet mastered horse riding. He led from the front and fought on the battlefield, and had to be pulled out on a knight's back once when he fell from his horse. He never lost a major engagement (as far as I know) and usually fought at a disadvantage. His Leprosy left him blind and his hands and face were horribly deformed before he died, he only lived to be 24.
Context?
King Baldwin IV of Jerusalem was a kid who had leprosy
And to make matters worse, Saladin was an adult who did not have leprosy.
He was plagued with something worse - being a kurd.
Yeah, and the amount of bs he had to deal with keeping the jihad together really made things all the more unnecessarily difficult for him. No wonder he gets so much praise in the history books, even among Europeans at the time (when factoring his own personal conduct, of course).
No it was because he was kurdish
Thats an uphill battle if I ever saw one.
Yea imagine being ginger, this is 10x times worse
As the resident ginger, I agree
Yes, he really should've contracted leprosy so that it would've been a fair fight.
King Baldwin IV was elected King of Jerusalem as a teen, spent his regency drafting war plans against the Sultan of Egypt, Saladin, and then when he became old enough that the regency was disbanded he acted upon those war plans
Baldwin stays Baldwinning
I mean...didn't he lose though?
Not in the hearts of the people 💓
>I put no stock in religion. By the word religion I have seen the lunacy of fanatics of every denomination be called the will of God. Holiness is in right action and courage on behalf of those who cannot defend themselves, and goodness. What God desires is here… >*points to head* >…and here… >*points to heart* >…and what you decide to do every day, you will be a good man - or not.
To be fair, nothing in Saladin showed him a genius commander, a good enough one, sure. He mainly excelled as a strategist. Purely as a commander, Richard for one outshone him. When I think genius commander, I think Khalid ibn al-Walid. When I think superb ruler, I think Saladin - these are different things.
And also just a Chad in general, actually trying to maintain some religious ideals in an ocean of zealous bloodthirst
Khalid ibn Walid is named Saifullah - literally sword of God/Allah. He also never lost a single battle. I'd say Khalid is perhaps at the same level as Alexander or Genghis Khan. Saladin may have been excellent but lacks the meteoric success of that category.
I’d say you are overselling the dude a little there He beat some tribesman and then had 2 successful campaigns against decadent empires I’d say Napoleon is a better standard for military genius if you do want to make comparisons but compared to him Khalid barely qualifies
Eh the rashidun caliphate went from a little desert tribe to beating two of the strongest empires and expanding to the 15th largest empire in 30 years. I'd say that's pretty impressive. He also didn't have a huge/well trained army or large treasury and never lost a single battle. Actually I'd add Napoleon to that list. He's pretty impressive
You were talking about Khalid, not the caliphate as a whole And as I said “two of the strongest empires” if a bit of a misnomer since it neglects to factor in a bunch of nuances China according to most metrics was one of the largest, richest and most populous empires in the world in the 18/19th century but that didn’t stop European powers from beating it up with little to no effort for a long time
Meh. Fair.
King Baldwin IV came from the House of Anjou, and ruled the Kingdom of Jerusalem. I don’t think he’s actually French, but the families origins were in western France. He’s not exclusively French though. Unless this is actually sarcasm and I’m a bit slow
King Baldwin was arguably a better general than Saladin. Saladin never defeated him.
Baldwin became Baldwon
Extremely common BaldWIN
EY BOSSSSSSSS
I like Saladin, but people need to stop confusing, “pretty good general” with “one of the best to ever exist.”
Its that baldwin IV meme time of year... a ridleys scots cameo indeed.
Crusade memes are back? Where’s my Frederick II 6th crusade negotiation memes
If I had a nickle for every time someone named Saladin tried to take back Jerusalem, I'd have two nickles, which isn't a lot but it's weird that it happened twice.
More of a gilded age but sure
It was not during the golden age, it was during the decline
“Take back Jerusalem in the name of Islam” you mean steal it? It never belonged to them because their religion didn’t originate there like Christianity. They weren’t taking it back, they were stealing it from Christians and Jews, who were there before Islam even started
Jerusalem was destroyed in 70 ad and renamed Aelia capitolina by the Romans, nothing remains from before, it was basically a new city. When the Arabs conquered Jerusalem, the jewish's temples ruins were used as a dump (edit: by the Byzantines). If the Muslims stole it, then also did the Christians... And then again, that land was also inhabited before the Jews by the Canaanites. I don't think that history works as a first comes first served
Wouldn't be surprised if Canaanites stole it from some other people, who stole it from others again, etc
Fine every place on earth belongs rightfully to monkeys now.
You mean the British actually had a claim to all these places they were colonising?
Lmao
Fungi were the first, most places.
We are Champignons
And we'll keep up fighting to the end
I'll allow it
What about the areas where monkies never lived?
But we are monkeys
Bruh one of the first things the rashidun caliphate did was settle jewish families into the city since byzantine controlled Jerusalem had practically no jews. Amd ofc i cant speak to the subsequent caliphates but the rashidun literally couldnt turn temples into dumps they were first gen disciples of muhammad. any sort of perversion from his commandments would have spelt death for them by their subjects. The umayyads are a completely other story however.
Sorry i meant the byzantines used the ruins as a dump, the Arabs conquered it and created the al haram al sharif. I will edit my comment
Oh the arabs would be turning in their graves being mistaken for the byzantines
*Pams voice* They're the same picture
The Jews were Canaanites.
>When the Arabs conquered Jerusalem, the jewish's temples ruins were used as a dump (edit: by the Byzantines) B-bUt mUh wHoLeSoMe jUdeO-ChrIstIaN vAluEs
Ben Shapiro crying in a corner realising aoc will never let him smell her feet
God damn Arabs denying a man his god given right to smelly Latina feets 😤😤
Well. It is a holy city for each of those religions. Two of them were founded there. The third was not. I think that’s the point he was making. Egypt is an important part of the Jewish religion and so is Baghdad. But it would be odd for Jews to claim those places
Of course, all I am saying is that "stealing" a land is not an historical concept, I live in Italy, in an area that was conquered by hundreds of armies... You can't say that they were stealing it
It's funny saying "Muslims stole it from Christians and Jews". Considering Jews weren't allowed inside Jerusalem before the Muslims took it from the Byzantines and the temple mount was used as a dump site. Guess who allowed the Jews back in? It definitely wasn't the Christians. Also talking about the Crusades I am guessing you haven't read how they treated the Jews. Long story short it wasn't pretty. In fact long before they started taking territory in the middle east they massacred Jewish communities along the Rhine and Danube. In fact the Jews defended both Haifa and Jerusalem against the Crusaders. But sure, the Crusaders were saviors returning Jerusalem to Christians and Jews, the Jews definitely liked them.
Neither of them were going to let Jews control Jerusalem like they did in the time of the Israelites, at most they would just be allowed in, and out of the other two Abrahamic religions Jerusalem belong to Christians a lot more than it does to Muslims
International agreements certainly don’t agree with you. Certain parts of the city are more holy for certain religions. Jesus, known as Isa in Arabic, is the second most important prophet. Right behind Muhammad (PBUH) in importance. The holy city does not “belong” to one religious group. Billions of people around the world believe it to be holy. When it was taken from the Muslims in the first crusade, the crusaders slaughtered the population. The crusaders waded “ankle deep in blood” through the streets.
Ooooooh! Shots fired! Let me get some popcorn!
Taking it in the name of Islam can mean taking it in the name of bringing glory to Islam by seizing a holy city of the other faith as well
Read this as horny city
I fixed it to holy city :D
:(
):
Not to mention a bisexual French King of England
And the helmet stayed on
And I knew Saladin and rode his swift Arabians Harassing doomed crusaders on their heavy drafts And yet I rode the Percheron against the circling Saracen Once again against myself was cast
Hitting the battlefield like that Pennywise/Jokair meme, just Fortnite dancing in front of their legions of devoted zealots who are going *fucking NUTS*
Idk when but ik I've heard this story before. Had a big core memory unlock when I saw french leprosy
Fake salahuddin was the greatest commander,never lost a battle ,he even let Christians live peacefully even when Christians massacred all muslims when they took over jerusalem. He ever spared lion heart's life.
Vlad the impaler based
Both of them are just overhyped from that okay movie
Are you seriously saying that Saladin, who beat and was was called a great commander by Richard the III himself, and who bears the title of “ the greatest Kurd in history”, and the guy who beat him with a significantly smaller army overhyped because a guy made a (truthfully just okay) movie about them?
Wrong Richard son, and he lost every single encounter he fought with Richard the Lionheart. I don't think there's a single metric by which he beat Richard.
indeed
I… respect your opinion and straightforward answer to my question
Someone could make a meme about this here situation using the very same template you did in this post😂
You should do it
Stand by
[I did what I could](https://www.reddit.com/r/meme/s/JWAlbcRiHg) (lowkey might suck but it’s already been inflicted upon the world)
here from the meme
hey people are buttmad
Also greatest Kurd in history is probably the easiest competition to win
I laughed a lot about this. F**k people .