Written by Amin Maalouf
Format: MP3
Unabridged As the name suggests, the book is a narrative retelling of primary sources drawn from various Arab chronicles that seeks to provide an Arab perspective on the Crusades, and especially about the Crusaders – the Franks (Franj), as they called them – what are considered cruel, savage, ignorant and culturally backward. From the first invasion, in eleventh century, until the general collapse of the Crusades, in the thirteenth century, the book constructs a narrative that is the reverse of that current in the Western world, describing the main facts bellicose, and displaying situations of a quaint historic setting where Christians are viewed as "barbarians", unaware of the most elementary rules of honor, dignity and social ethics.