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At the selected date, the colour of each place shows who held it. To learn its story, click or tap a country or marker.
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In 1095, three civilizations lay around the medieval Mediterranean. On this situation map, Latin Christendom appears in blue, a shrunken Byzantium in tan, the Islamic powers in charcoal from Iberia to Iraq, and Shia Fatimid Egypt in grey. The word “crusade” did not yet exist. Four years later, a new red presence appeared on the Levant coast: the crusader states, or Outremer, “the land beyond the sea.” Watch Outremer grow to its peak in the 1150s, collapse in a single day at Hattin, hold on to a thread of coastline for a century, and finally vanish at Acre in 1291.
How did that brief arrival become a venture lasting two centuries? The twelve chapters consider why the moment of 1095 was open, why the First Crusade succeeded when everything after it failed, and how a few thousand Franks ruled a kingdom they could never fill. They follow Saladin’s remaking of the war and ask how a crusade against Islam came to sack Christian Constantinople. They also examine what the venture made: changes in trade and knowledge, and wounds still not healed. Take the guided tour, or scrub the timeline and interrogate the map yourself.
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You can return to the library of twenty-one atlases at any time: select the balloon at the top left.