The Crusades to the Holy Land: The Essential Reference Guide. Edited by Alan V. Murray. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2015. 330 pages. Acid free $89 (ISBN: 978-1-61069-779-8). E-book available (978-1-61069-780-4), call for pricing.
Murray has pulled together an accessible and informative reference guide to the crusades from the Council of Clermont in 1095 until the final surrender of Christian-held territories in Palestine and Syria at the end of the thirteenth century.
Essays range from one column to six pages in this textbook-sized, single volume. They cover topics including the various crusades, sources from the various ethnic and national groups involved in the crusades, important people, tribes, places, and discussions of subjects such as “Castles” and “Preaching and Sermons.” Essays include suggestions for further reading.
The work includes both Christian and Muslim subjects, and it maintains an objective voice throughout, but the focus gravitates toward the European history of the crusades. Because of its fairness and accessibility, it would work well in a collection limited to one reference volume specifically about the crusades, and would be preferable in this role to a work such as Carole Hillebrand’s Crusades: Islamic Perspectives (Edinburgh University Press, 1999). However, Hillebrand’s work would complement this work as a conscious step away from default western perspectives.
Such a role as a sole reference work in the area is especially enhanced by three longer, introductory essays titled “Overview,” “Causes,” and “Consequences.” Anyone needing a historical refresher, an introduction to the crusades, or to their lingering effects would benefit from these interesting and readable essays. A thorough chronology toward the end of the volume is also useful for orientation.
The index is quite thorough, listing all people, places, structures, and tribes mentioned in the essays in addition to main entry topics, which enhances accessibility, as does the readable content. The work contains an unobtrusive number of interesting grayscale images of appropriate artwork and maps. The hardbound cover is interesting and attractive, but not pretentious.
The Crusades to the Holy Land: The Essential Reference Guide lives up to its subtitle. The work could indeed be an essential starting point for a researcher who is not already an expert on the crusades. It points the researcher farther down the road as well. This work belongs in collections supporting undergraduate and secondary educational programs, or graduate programs that might tangentially require a refresher about this period of western history that still haunts us today.—Steven R. Edscorn, Executive Director of Libraries, Northeastern State University, Tahlequah, Oklahoma