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Historical person
1138–1193
Saladin was a Kurdish military leader who became sultan of Egypt and Syria and founded the Ayyubid dynasty. He ended Fatimid rule in Egypt, united much of the Muslim Near East and defeated the crusader army at Hattin in 1187, recovering Jerusalem. During the Third Crusade he fought Richard I and negotiated a settlement that left Jerusalem under Muslim rule while permitting Christian pilgrimage.
After recovering Jerusalem in 1187, Saladin faced the Third Crusade and a prolonged military contest with Richard I of England. Neither ruler achieved complete victory: the Treaty of Jaffa in 1192 left Jerusalem under Muslim control while allowing Christian pilgrims access and preserving a reduced crusader presence on the coast. Saladin died in Damascus the following year, and his territories were divided among members of the Ayyubid family.
Jan Guillou’s Birth of the Kingdom shows Saladin through the legacy of Arn Magnusson’s crusading years: Arn returns to Sweden with Arabian horses, gold and knowledge acquired in the eastern Mediterranean, including gifts associated with Saladin. The novel Crusader builds the Angevin and military background that will eventually bring Richard I into direct conflict with Saladin on the Third Crusade. Simon Sebag Montefiore’s Jerusalem places Saladin in the documented history of the city, especially his recovery of Jerusalem after Hattin and the political settlement that followed. Dan Jones’s Crusaders treats him as one of the major Muslim rulers who transformed the balance of power against the crusader states. Alfred Duggan’s Richard and Saladin concentrates on the Third Crusade itself, comparing the two commanders through Acre, Arsuf and the negotiations that ended without either side achieving complete victory.
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Series
The Roger of Huntley series follows a fugitive monk and crusader through the violence of the Third Crusade and the later crisis of King John’s reign. The early books place Roger among soldiers, pilgrims and rulers in the eastern Mediterranean, while the later novels return him to England…
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The Brotherhood follows the fictional Templar Thomas Cronin through the wars of the Crusader states and the political consequences of the Fourth Crusade. The sequence begins under Baldwin IV of Jerusalem, when Saladin's growing power threatens the remaining Christian territories. Montgisard, Jacob's Ford, Hattin, the siege of Acre…
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The Crusades Trilogy follows Arn Magnusson, a fictional nobleman from twelfth-century Götaland, from a monastic childhood through service as a Knight Templar and return to a divided Scandinavian homeland. The Road to Jerusalem establishes the rivalry between the Erik and Sverker factions and Arn’s forbidden relationship with Cecilia…
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Elizabeth Chadwick’s William Marshal cycle follows the Marshal family and the households bound to it from the civil war of the Anarchy to the crisis of King John’s reign. A Place Beyond Courage centres on William’s father, John Marshal, while The Greatest Knight and The Scarlet Lion trace…
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Ferdia, a young Irish noble held hostage after the English invasion of Ireland, saves the life of Henry II’s son Richard and enters his service. He accompanies Richard through rebellion against his father, warfare in Aquitaine and the struggle for the English crown. When Richard becomes king, Ferdia…
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The Outlaw Chronicles reimagine Robin Hood as Robert Odo, Earl of Locksley, a charismatic and violent criminal lord remembered by his lieutenant Alan Dale. The original novels carry Alan from his entry into the Sherwood band through the Third Crusade, Richard I’s wars, the loss of Normandy, Magna…
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The Islam Quintet is Tariq Ali’s cycle of five historical novels examining encounters between Islamic societies and the Christian West across more than five centuries. Moving from the fall of Muslim Granada and the Crusades to Norman Sicily, the late Ottoman Empire and the modern transnational world, the…
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The five Angevin novels trace the Plantagenet dynasty from the succession crisis after Henry I through Henry II and Eleanor’s turbulent marriage, their sons’ rebellions, Richard I’s crusade, captivity and final campaigns. The sequence combines royal family drama with the Anarchy, Angevin state-building, church–crown conflict and the Third…
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The Plantagenet Saga spans the dynasty from Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine to Richard III. Across fourteen novels, family rebellion, disputed succession, royal marriage and war connect the Angevin Empire, the conquest of Wales, conflict with Scotland, the Hundred Years’ War and the Wars of the Roses.
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The Templar trilogy follows members of the St. Clair family and a secret brotherhood whose history is bound to the rise and destruction of the Knights Templar. Beginning in the aftermath of the First Crusade, the sequence moves through the disasters of Hattin and the Third Crusade before…
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The Crusader series follows the fictional Lancastrian knight Frederick Banastre and his descendants through the conflicts of the Angevin and early Plantagenet monarchy. Frederick enters the household of the future Richard I, campaigns in France and the Holy Land, and becomes involved in the political struggles caused by…
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Standalone books
Non Fiction
Biographies, histories and other non-fiction are listed separately from the historical novels above.
