Eleanor of Aquitaine: one of the most powerful women of the Middle Ages; queen of France, then of England; companion of the Second Crusade along with her then-husband Louis VII of France; patroness of troubadours (1204)
Elvira of Castile: daughter of Alfonso VI and Zaida (Isabella); queen of Norman Sicily (1135)
Eraclius (of Caesarea): notorious Latin patriarch of Jerusalem in the time of Saladin (1199)
Eudo of Aquitaine: partner of Charles Martel in the victory over the Muslims at Poitiers in 732 (736?)
Eudoxia: first wife of Heraclius (612)
Eudoxia Macrembolitissa: Byzantine empress; niece of Cerularius, patriarch of the Great Schism; widow of Constantine X Ducas; through subterfuge wed Romanus IV Diogenes (1096)
Fatima: daughter of Muhammad; wed to Ali (632)
Prernando III: Castilian king of the reconquista, later canonized; captured most remaining cities of al-Andalus, save Granada (1253)
Fibonacci, Leonardo: Pisan mathematician (1250)
Francis of Assisi: founder of the Franciscan order of friars; canonized; attempted to convert Muslims of Egypt during the Fifth Crusade (1226)
Frederick II: king of Sicily and Holy Roman Emperor; polyglot scholar and tyrant known as Stupor Mundi (1250)
George of Antioch: twelfth-century adventurer; first in the employ of the Ifriqiyans, then admiral for Roger II of Sicily
Gerard of Cremona: foremost translator of Toledo (1187)
Gerard of Ridefort: tenth master of the Templars; credited with hotheaded advice leading to the Latin defeat at Hattin in 1187 (1189)
Gibbon, Edward: Enlightenment historian of the decline and fall of the Roman Empire (1794)
Giustiniani Longo, Giovanni: Genoese siege expert; commander of the land walls during the siege of Constantinople (1453)
Gregory (of Carthage): patrician Byzantine rebel against Constans II; slain by Arabs during conquest of north Africa (647)
Guiscard, Robert: Norman adventurer; threatened Byzantine Empire; conquered much of southern Italy (1185)
Guy of Lusignan: king of Jerusalem; vanquished at Hattin in 1187 (1194)
Hakam II, al-: Umayyad caliph of al-Andalus; eldest son of Abd al-Rahman III; famed for his learning and bookishness (976)
Halil Pasha, Chandarli: principal adviser of Ottoman sultan Murad II; advocate of peace with the Greeks; executed by Mehmet II (1454)
Hamza: uncle of the Prophet; killed at battle of Uhud; body mutilated by Meccans (625)
Harun al-Rashid: Abbasid caliph at apogee of Baghdadi power (reigned 789—806)
Hasday ibn Shaprut: Jewish physician-vizier-diplomat of Andalusi caliph Abd al-Rahman III (970)
Henry of Champagne: king of Jerusalem; ambassador to Assassins (1197)
Heraclius: Byzantine emperor; wrested Near East back from Persians only to lose it to the Muslims (641)
Hind: wife of Abu Sufyan; desecrator of Hamza's body; Meccan skeptic; participant in the Battle of Yarmuk in 636
Hisham II, al-: Umayyad caliph of al-Andalus; son of al-Hakam II; kept under house arrest in the Madinat az-Zahra by Almanzor (1013)
Hulegu: Mongol destroyer of Baghdad in 1258 (1265)
Huseyn: son of Ali; grandson of the Prophet; killed at Karbala (680)
Ibn Hawkal: Iraqi traveler and writer (990)
Ibn Hazm: Cordoban theologian and man of letters during the fall of the Umayyad caliphate (1063)
Ibn Jubayr: Andalusi traveler and writer (1217)
Ibn Khaldun: greatest historian of the Middle Ages; Moroccan scholar exiled to Mamluk Egypt (1406)
Ibn Tumart: Berber founder of the Almohads; mahdi (1130)
Idrisi, al-: scientist and geographer in twelfth-century Norman Palermo (1166)
Il-Ghazi: Turcoman ruler of Aleppo; victor at the Field of Blood (1122)
Jimenez de la Rada, Rodrigo: archbishop of Toledo; chronicler and reconquista historian (1247)
Julian of Ceuta: quasi-legendary eighth-century Byzantine governor; abetted Muslim invasion of Spain
Justinian: Byzantine emperor; lawgiver; builder of the Hagia Sophia (565)
Kahina: Berber prophetess and queen; leader of resistance to Arab conquest of the Maghrib (704?)
Khadija: widow who married Muhammad; Islam's first convert (619)
Khalid Ibn al Walid: victorious general in 636 at Yarmuk (642)
Kilij Arslan: Seljuk Rum sultan; slaughtered People's Crusade in Bithynia; lost to First Crusade at Dorylaeum in 1097 (1107)
Kobilic, Milos: shadowy historical figure; supposed assassin of Sultan Murad I at the first battle of Kosovo in 1389
Kukburi: emir of Harran and Edessa; general of Saladin at Hattin in 1187
Lazar (Hrebeljanovic): Serbian prince slain at the first battle of Kosovo in 1389
Lazarevic, Stefan: son of Prince Lazar Hrebeljanovic; vassal-ally of Ottoman sultan Beyazit I; later quasi-independent despot of Serbia (1427)
Leo III: iconoclast Byzantine emperor; repelled enormous Muslim fleet before Constantinople (740 Llull, Ramon: Franciscan; Majorcan polyglot theologian and thinker (1316)
López de Haro, Diego: Castilian nobleman; effective commander of the army at Las Navas de Tolosa in 1212 (1214)
Louis VII: French monarch; leader of the Second Crusade; briefly husband of Eleanor of Aquitaine (1180)
Malik al-Kamil: Ayyubid sultan; Saladin's nephew; parried Fifth Crusade; agreed to lease on Jerusalem in the Sixth Crusade (1238)
Malikshah: successor of Alp Arslan to Seljuk sultanate; long friction with Vizier Nizam al-Mulk (1092)
Mam'un, al-: eleventh-century taifa king of Toledo; patron of the arts and sciences (1075)
Maniakes, George: colossus; Byzantine general; conqueror of Antioch and Edessa; frustrated general in the reconquest of Sicily; failed rebel (1043)
Manuel I Comnenus: Byzantine emperor; loser at Myriokephalon; builder of Blachernae fortifications (1180)
Martina: niece and wife of Heraclius (642)
Mehmet II (Fatih the Conqueror): Ottoman sultan; took Constantinople in 1453 (1481)
Moses Maimonides: Sephardic Cordoban; philosopher; rabbi; compiler of Jewish law; physician to Saladin's family in Cairo (1204)
Muawiya: first Umayyad caliph; son of Abu Sufyan; victor over Ali (680)
Muhammad al-Nasir: Almohad caliph; defeated at Las Navas de Tolosa in 1212 (1213)
Muhammad Ibn Abdallah: Prophet of Islam (632)
Mihammad Ibn Ishaq: first biographer of Muhammad (767)
Marad I: Ottoman sultan killed at the first battle of Kosovo (1389)
Mirad II: Ottoman sultan; victor at Varna and the second battle of Kosovo (1451)
Musa ibn Nusayr: governor of Ifriqiya; authorized conquest of Visigothic Spain (716)
Mustapha Pasha: commander of Ottoman army defeated before Malta in 1565
Mustarshid, al-: Abbasid caliph; tried to regain authority from the Turkish sultanate in twelfth century (1135)
Mu'tamid, al-: last poet-king of taifa Seville; deposed by Almoravids (1095)
Najm al-Din Ayyub: Kurdish chieftain of Tikrit; governor of Baalbek; father of Saladin (1173)
Ni '.am al-Mulk: powerful Persian vizier of Alp Arslan and Malikshah; patron of madrasas; kil ed by Assassins (1092)
Nur al-Din: son and successor of Zengi; uniter of Damascus and Aleppo (1174)
Orhan: second Ottoman sultan; began Turkish move into Balkans (1360)
Osman: founder of Ottoman (also called Osmanli) dynasty (1326)
Pedro II: king of Aragon; participant at Las Navas de Tolosa (1213)
Phocas: Byzantine emperor noted for cruelty; deposed and executed by Heraclius (610)
Phrantzes, George: Byzantine statesman and historian; eyewitness at the siege of Co istantinople in 1453 (1478)
Psellus, Michael: Byzantine courtier and kingmaker; memoirist (1078)
Raymond of Poitiers: prince of Antioch; suspected of dallying with his niece, Eleanor of Aquitaine; reluctant participant in the Second Crusade (1149)
R
aymond of Toledo: broad-minded archbishop; great patron of the translators (1187)
Raymond of Tripoli: great baron of Outremer of the Saint-Gilles family; advice rejected prior to the Battle of Hattin in 1187 (1188)
Revnaud of Chatillon: obstreperous adventurer of Outremer; prince of Antioch, then lord of Outre-Jourdain; executed on Saladin's order at Hattin (1187)
Richard Lionheart: King Richard I of England; leader of the Third Crusade; nemesis of Saladin (1199)
Ridwan: Seljuk ruler of Aleppo; friend of Assassins (113)
Rodrigo (Roderic): last Visigothic king of Spain; lost to Muslims at Guadalete (711)
Roger II: greatest Norman king of Sicily; patron of learning; nephew of Robert Guiscard (1154)
Romanus IV Diogenes: Byzantine emperor defeated at Manzikert in 1071 (1072)
Roussel of Bailleul: Norman adventurer; fought with George Maniakes in Sicily; deserted Romanus IV at Manzikert; later carved out ephemeral kingdom in Anatolia (1078)
Saladin (Salah al-Din Yusuf ibn Ayyub): Kurdish founder of Ayyubid dynasty; victor at Hattin; conqueror of Jerusalem (1193)
Sancho VII: king of Navarre who fought at Las Navas de Tolosa in 1212; surnamed elFuerte, the Strong (1229)
Seljuk: eponymous leader who brought Seljuk Turks into Afghanistan and Persia in the early eleventh century
Shahrbaraz: Persian general of Chosroes II; took Damascus and Jerusalem from Byzantines; shahanshah for three months before being assassinated (630)
Shirkuh: brother of Najm al-Din Ayyub and uncle of Saladin; general for Zengi and Nur al-Din; conqueror of Fatimid Egypt (1169)
Shmuel HaNagid: rabbi; poet, general, and vizier of taifa Granada (1055)
Sibylla: queen of Jerusalem; sister of leper-king Baldwin IV; wed to Guy of Lusignan (1190)
Sichelgaita: second wife of Robert Guiscard; eleventh-century Lombard princess reputed to be fearsome warrior; gave Robert three sons and seven daughters
Simeon Stylites: sainted hermit of Byzantine Syria who lived more than three decades atop a pillar (459)
Sinan ibn Salman ibn Muhammad (The Old Man of the Mountain): leader of the Assassin sect in the Jebel Ansariye mountain range of Syria (1192)
Sophronius: monk and theologian opposed to monothelitism; later Byzantine patriarch of Jerusalem at the time of the Arab conquest (638)
Stephen Dushan: king, later czar of Serbia; created ephemeral Slav Balkan empire (1355)
Subh: Basque beauty and powerful concubine of Andalusi Umayyad caliph al-Hakam II; mother of al-Hisham II; lover of Almanzor (1012)
Suleyman I the Magnifcent: Ottoman sultan at the apogee of empire; a lawgiver and conqueror of much of the Balkans and central Asia; patron of the arts and especially architecture through his master builder, Sinan (1566)
Taliq al-Din: Saladin's nephew; general at Hattin
Tarchaniotes, Joseph: Byzantine general who deserted at Manzikert
Tariq ibn Ziyad: governor of Tangier; leader of the Muslim conquest of Spain (720)
Timur Leng: Mongol warlord of Samarkand; conqueror of much of central Asia; victor over the Ottomans at the battle of Ankara in 1402 (1405)
Tughril Bey: Seljuk Turk leader; conqueror of Baghdad; first Seljuk sultan under the Abbasids (1063)
Ukba ibn Nafi: founder of Kairouan (670) ; leader of a famous razzia the entire length of the Maghrib; killed on the return journey (683)
Umar (bin al-Khattab): second caliph of Islam; ruler at the time of Yarmuk and capture of Jerusalem; the Dome of the Rock is also called the Mosque of Umar (644)
Urban: Hungarian cannon-founder whose weapons greatly aided the Ottoman capture of Constantinople in 1453
Urban II: pope who preached the First Crusade at Clermont; advocate of reforms initiated by Gregory VII (1099)
Usamah ibn Munqidh: Syrian nobleman from Shayzar, near the Jebel Ansariye; author of a :colorful memoir (1188)
Uthman ibn Affan: third calilph of Islam; generally credited with spurring the compilation of he Quran; his murder sparked off first Muslim civil war (656)
Vahan: Armenian commander; leader of Byzantine center at Yarmuk (636?)
Valette, Jean Parisot de la: forty-eighth grand master of the Knights of the Hospital of St. John; Commander of the defense of Malta; eponym of Valletta (1568)
William of Tyre: archbishop of Tyre; chancellor of the kingdom of Jerusalem; author of an authoritative history of Outremer to 1184 (1190?)
Xiphilinus, John: Byzantine patriarch; historian; victim of Eudoxia Macrembolitissa's Cissembling about her marriage plans (1075)
Zahar: favorite concubine of Abd al-Rahman III; reputedly the eponym of Madinat az-Zahara
Zaida: Muslim lady of Seville; lover then wife of Alfonso VI, conqueror of Toledo; convert to Christianity (1107)
7 arrar ibn al Azwar: warrior who distinguished himself at Ajnadayn and Yarmuk 7 engi: ruler of Aleppo and Mosul; initiator of Muslim resistance to Outremer; captured Edessa is 1144, thus sparking the Second Crusade (1146)
Ziryab: Baghdadi musician; ninth-century arbiter of cultural taste in Umayyad Córdoba, under sponsorship of Abd al-Rahman II
SELECT TIMELINE
330 Constantine the Great founds the new city of Constantinople
376 Visigoths kill Emperor Valens at the battle of Adrianople
410 Alaric sacks Rome
476 Fall of the western Roman Empire
537 Completion of the Hagia Sophia
565 Death of Emperor Justinian
570 Birth of Muhammad
610 Heraclius becomes Byzantine emperor
622 Muhammad flees to Madina; Year One of the Muslim calendar
630 Heraclius takes Jerusalem
632 Death of Muhammad
636 Battle of Yarmuk
638 Caliph Umar takes Jerusalem
642 Muslim capture of Alexandria
661 Murder of Ali; beginning of Umayyad dynasty
670 Foundation of Kairouan
678 Caliph Muawiya fails before Constantinople
678 Beginning of Pippinid dynasty in western Europe
680 Murder of Huseyn; genesis of shia schism
685 Construction of Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem
698 Destruction of Byzantine Carthage; foundation of Tunis
704 Defeat of Kahina, Berber queen in north Africa
706 Construction of Umayyad mosque of Damascus
711 Muslim conquest of Visigothic Spain begins
718 Leo III defeats Muslims at Constantinople
732 Battle of Poitiers
750 Downfall of Umayyads; rise of Abbasids
755 Abd al-Rahman I arrives in Spain
762 Foundation of Baghdad
784 Construction begins on the Mezquita of Córdoba,
800 Charlemagne crowned emperor of the west
827 Muslim conquest of Sicily begins
846 Muslim raid on Rome
854 Christian martyrs of Córdoba,
862 Byzantine mission sent to convert the Slavs
910 Rise of shia Fatimid caliphs in north Africa
910 Foundation of Cluny monastic movement
929 Abd al-Rahman III declares himself caliph in Córdoba,
962 Otto the Great founds Holy Roman Empire
973 Foundation of Cairo
1000 Conversion to Christianity of Scandinavians and Hungarians
1002 Death of Almanzor
1009 Fatimid caliph al-Hakim razes Church of Holy Sepulchre
1025 Death of Basil the Bulgar-Slayer; start of Byzantine decline
1031 End of Umayyad caliphate in Córdoba,
1046 Robert Guiscard arrives in Italy
1054 Great Schism between Latin and Orthodox Christianity
1055 Seljuk Turks take Baghdad
1071 Battle of Manzikert
1072 Norman conquest of Palermo
1073 Pontificate of Gregory VII begins (d. 1085)
1085 Castilian capture of Toledo
1086 Almoravids arrive in Spain
1095 Council of Clermont launches crusading movement
1099 Death of El Cid
1099 First Crusade takes Jerusalem
1146 Death of Zengi; rise of Nur al-Din
1148 Failure of Second Crusade before Damascus
1154 Almohads supplant Almoravids in Spain
1167 Construction of Monreale cathedral
1171 Saladin abolishes Fatimid caliphate
1174 Death of Nur al-Din
1178 Battle of Myriokephalon
1183 Construction of the Giralda
1187 Battle of Hattin
1187 Saladin enters Jerusalem
1189—92 Third Crusade fails to recapture Jerusalem
119 5 Almohad capture of Alarcos
1198 Pontificate of Innocent III begins (d. 1216)
1204 Fourth Crusade sacks Constantinople
1209 Albigensian Crusade begins
1212 Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa
1219 Francis of Assisi at Damietta
Sea of Faith Page 38
