As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. Affiliate disclosure.
Historical person
c. 1233–1291
Guillaume de Beaujeu was the twenty-first Grand Master of the Knights Templar and one of the principal military leaders defending the remaining Crusader possessions in the Holy Land. Elected grand master in 1273, he spent much of his career in the eastern Mediterranean and was in Acre when the Mamluk sultan al-Ashraf Khalil launched the decisive siege in 1291.
As Templar grand master and a defender of Acre, Beaujeu was one of the senior military figures in the final major battle for the mainland Crusader states. Guillaume de Beaujeu was born in Kingdom of France and died in Acre.
Roger Crowley’s The Accursed Tower follows the siege from the tightening Mamluk encirclement through bombardment, mining, assaults on the walls and the increasingly desperate defence led in part by the Templar grand master Guillaume de Beaujeu. In James H. Jackson’s Perdition, William of Beaujeu, Grand Master of the Knights Templar, attempts to preserve both the city and his military order while merchants, mercenaries, clergy and rival contingents struggle to cooperate.
Series
The Crusader Trilogy spans the final century of western European campaigning in the Holy Land. Penance, the earliest-set volume, begins with the murder of Thomas Becket and follows a physician serving Richard the Lionheart during the Third Crusade. Pilgrim moves to 1212, combining the Children’s Crusade with a…
All books in this series
Non Fiction
Biographies, histories and other non-fiction are listed separately from the historical novels above.
