August 20, 2004

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  813 YEARS AGO TODAY

  
  

  

  
  

  Aug 20 1191

  
  

  Crusaders massacre 2,700 bound Muslim prisoners at Acre, after a breakdown in negotiations over payment of their ransom. The killings take place in full view of the army from which they were taken.

  
  

  "King Richard determined that Saladin had hardened his heart and cared no longer about ransoming the hostages. He assembled a council of the greater men among the people and they decided that they would wait in vain no longer, but that they would behead the captives. They decided, however, to set apart some of the greater and more noble men on the chance that they might be ransomed or exchanged for some other Christian captives.

  
  

    

  
  

  King Richard always hoped to overwhelm the Turks completely, to crush their impudent arrogance, to confound the Moslem law, and to vindicate Christianity.
  

  On the Friday next after the feast of the Assumption of Blessed Mary, he ordered that two thousand seven hundred of the vanquished Turkish hostages be led out of the city and decapitated. Without delay his assistants rushed up and quickly carried out the order. They gave heartfelt thanks, since with the approval of divine grace, they were taking vengeance in kind for the death of the Christians whom these people had slaughtered with the missiles of their bows and ballistas."
  

  
  

  -Itinerarium Peregrinorum et Gesta Regis Ricardi

  
  

   

  • 5:44 pm
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