For over fifty years Sir Steven Runciman's epic three volume A History of the Crusades was the authoritative source for those seeking to understand that tumultuous period of history but with the publication of God's War the torch of crusader scholarship has been firmly passed to Oxford historian Christopher Tyerman. Over the course of more than a thousand pages, Tyerman introduces and analyses the centuries of religious struggles which makes up the Crusades, a period which manages to be both one of the most infamous in history as well as one of the most misunderstood. Although there had been decades of distrust between the predominantly Christian Europe and the mainly Muslim Middle East, the trigger factor for the launching of the First Crusade in 1095 was the plea for help against the invading Muslim armies from the Byzantine Emperor Alexios I to Pope Urban II. There was great fear about the loss of lands to the Muslims and so the Church was more than ready to aid Emperor Alexios in the defence of Byzantium and Christendom and, ultimately, in the recapture of Christian lands starting with Jerusalem. God's War is a wonderfully meticulous account of the Crusades and the personalities and factors behind them. Tyerman is a masterful researcher and has referenced a quite phenomenal number of primary and secondary sources.

For over fifty years Sir Steven Runciman's epic three volume A History of the Crusades was the authoritative source for those seeking to understand that tumultuous period of history but with the publication of God's War the torch of crusader scholarship has been firmly passed to Oxford historian Christopher Tyerman. Over the course of more than a thousand pages, Tyerman introduces and analyses the centuries of religious struggles which makes up the Crusades, a period which manages to be both one of the most infamous in history as well as one of the most misunderstood. Although there had been decades of distrust between the predominantly Christian Europe and the mainly Muslim Middle East, the trigger factor for the launching of the First Crusade in 1095 was the plea for help against the invading Muslim armies from the Byzantine Emperor Alexios I to Pope Urban II. There was great fear about the loss of lands to the Muslims and so the Church was more than ready to aid Emperor Alexios in the defence of Byzantium and Christendom and, ultimately, in the recapture of Christian lands starting with Jerusalem. God's War is a wonderfully meticulous account of the Crusades and the personalities and factors behind them. Tyerman is a masterful researcher and has referenced a quite phenomenal number of primary and secondary sources.