"Among the weblogs, the best coverage of the Churchill controversy has been in View from a Height..." -Dave Kopel, Rocky Mountain News

"In Colorado, the Rocky Mountain Alliance of Blogs is covering the hot GOP primary between beer magnate Pete Coors and former Rep. Bob Schaffer with a great deal more insight than the Denver newspapers." -John Fund, OpinionJournal.com

"The Rocky Mountain Alliance offers the best of what the blogosphere has to offer." -David Harsanyi, Denver Post
 contact
Joshua Sharf
 search


 notify list
to receive email when this site is updated, enter your email address:
 archives
 recent posts
 categories
Blogging 26 entries
Book Review 9 entries
Business 96 entries
China 2 entries
Colorado Politics 55 entries
Decision 2008 1 entries
Finance 6 entries
Flying 3 entries
General 83 entries
Higher Ed 28 entries
History 2 entries
History 2 entries
Israel 15 entries
Jewish 15 entries
Judicial Nomination 3 entries
Media Bias 5 entries
Movies 6 entries
Road Trip 5 entries
Social Investing 1 entries
Vote Fraud 7 entries
War on Terror 64 entries
 links
 blogs
Rocky Mtn. Alliance
Exultate Justi
American Kestrel
The Mangled Cat
Clay Calhoun
Mt. Virtus
My Damascus Road
Exvigilare
Best Destiny
Thinking Right
The Daily Blogster

Friends of the Alliance
Bill Hobbs
TyroBlog
Mile High Delphi
Flight Pundit
One Destination
Conservative Eyes
The Virginian Reporter
A Time for Choosing

other blogs
Oh, That Liberal Media
Powerline
Girl In Right
One Big Swede
American Thinker
Meryl Yourish
Instapundit
NRO Corner
Little Green Footballs
No Left Turns
A Constrained Vision

business blogs
800CEORead
Carnival of the Capitalists
Catallarchy
Cold Springs Shops
Commodity Trader
Coyote Blog
Different River
EconLog
Fast Company Blog
Financial Rounds
Footnoted
Freakonomics Blog
Lip-Sticking
Management Craft
Trader Mike
Carnival of the Capitalists Submission

business data
Inst. Supply Mgmt.
St. Louis Fed Economic Data
Nat'l Bureau of Economic Research
Economic Calendar
Stock Charts
colorado blogs
Boker Tov, Boulder
Colorado Pols
Jeff Sherman

<-?Colorado BlogRing#->

sites, not blogs
Thinking Rock Press
 help israel
Israel Travel Ministry
Friends of the IDF
Volunteers for Israel
Magen David Adom
 1939 World's Fair
1939: The Lost World of the Fair
The New York World's Fair: 1939-1940
The Last Great Fair by Jeffrey Hart
Iconography of Hope (U.Va.)
Images From the '39 Fair
 google ads
Powered by
Movable Type 2.64

May 05, 2005

Eastward, Ho!

This evening, I'll be at an advance screening of Ridley Scott's latest epic, Kingdom of Heaven, about the fall of Jerusalem in 1187 to Saladin. Review to follow.

While doing a little background reading this morning, I found a few interesting tidbits to chew on. First, from Barbara Tuchman's Bible and Sword: England and Palestine from the Bronze Age to Balfour. In a turn of events disturbing to all conservatives, the fall of Jerusalem catalyzed Europe into launching the Third Crusade, and led to Henry II imposing England's first income tax.

The Saladin Tithe, as it was called, despite its high purpose was regarded, says Roger of Wendover, as "a violent extortion which veiled the vice of rapacity under the name of charity and alarmed the priesthood as well as the people."

The other comes from Norman Cantor's magisterial Medieval History. The Franks of First Crusade took advantage of Muslim disunity (cough) to establish a series of coastal Crusader Kingdoms. (The French have always done better at interleague play.) This brought them into close diplomatic contact with the still-dying Byzantines. While the disembarking Franks didn't exactly say, "Justinian, we have returned," the following should give one pause:

In the face of Byzantine grandeur and culture, the Franks had a strong sense of inferiority, and they compensated for their rusticity and crudeness by condemning the Greeks and effeminate and corrupt. Actually the mannered Greek courtiers rightly found the Frankish prices boors by comparison with themselves. There was merit in each party's criticism of the other, but the Franks were representatives of a still youthful and extremely vital civilization, while Byzantium was sterile and decadents and have to rely on its western enemies for salvation from the more pressing Arab foe.

I guess the Franks have been overcompensating ever since, but the echoes are unmistakable.

Posted by joshuasharf at May 5, 2005 08:04 AM | TrackBack

Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking


Back in Action : An American Soldier's Story of Courage, Faith and Fortitude


How Would You Move Mt. Fuji?


Good to Great


Built to Last


Financial Fine Print


The Balanced Scorecard for Public-Sector Organizations


The Balanced Scorecard for Government & Non-Profits


The Balanced Scorecard: Measures that Drive Performance


The Balanced Scorecard: Translating Strategy into Action


The Day the Universe Changed


Blog


The Multiple Identities of the Middle-East


The Case for Democracy


US Policy in Post-Saddam Iraq


A Better War: The Unexamined Victories and Final Tragedy of America's Last Years in Vietnam


The Italians


Zakhor: Jewish History and Jewish Memory


Beyond the Verse: Talmudic Readings and Lectures


Reading Levinas/Reading Talmud