Product Description: The bloody Albigensian Crusade launched against the Cathar heretics of southern France in the early thirteenth century is infamous for its brutality and savagery, even by the standards of the Middle Ages. It was marked by massacres and acts of appalling cruelty, deeds commonly ascribed to the role of religious fanaticism...read more

Product Description: John became king in 1199 and although all medieval kings had constantly to worry about financial issues, it is the inept way that John dealt with his that caused so much resentment. John lost his military campaigns; he was corrupt, indulged in blackmail, and manipulated the justice system more than any other king...read more

The first book on the important but overlooked French invasion of England in 1216, which was almost a second Norman Conquest History came within a hair's breadth of repeating itself, 150 years after the Norman Conquest. In 1216, taking advantage of the turmoil created in England by King John's inept rule and the war over Magna Carta, Prince Louis of France and his army of mercenaries and French soldiers invaded England and allied with English rebels. The prize was the crown of England. Within months Louis had seized control of one-third of the country, including London. This is the first book to cover the bloody events of the invasion, one of the most dramatic but most overlooked episodes of British history. The text vividly describes the campaigns, sieges, battles, and atrocities of the invasion and its colorful leaders—Louis the Lion, King John, William Marshal, and the mercenaries Fawkes de Béauté and Eustace the Monk—to offer the first detailed military analysis of this epic struggle for England.

Lands laid waste, civilians slaughtered, prisoners massacred: this is the grisly truth about warfare in the Middle Ages, now captured in all its horror. This original, authoritative account, perfect for the general reader, examines the celebrated battles of Acre and Agincourt; the sieges on Béziers, Lincoln, Jerusalem, and Limoges; the devastating Hundred Years' War; and the destruction wrought by "chivalric" kings such as Henry V and Richard the Lionheart. From this brutality, there finally emerged more humane "rules of war."

Product Description: The Invasion of England vividly describes the sieges, battles, and atrocities of the second invasion of England -- 150 years after the Norman Conquest. It was led by Louis the Lion, who won control of one-third of the land, including London, within months of landing...read more