HIST 232   The Crusades (EU)

In 1099, a crusading army sacked Jerusalem, killing Muslims, Jews, and Christians alike. This act of savagery earned the crusade fame in Christian Europe and infamy in the Islamic world, prompting a crusade movement in the West and a military reaction in the East. The forces stirred up by these events also led Western Europe toward the conquest of Spain, Eastern Europe, Greece, and eventually the Americas and beyond. In this course, students study the causes, progress, and results of the Crusades themselves, as well as the new colonial societies that developed in their wake. Students focus on the transformation of four cultures: western Christendom, Judaism, Byzantium, and Islam. (EU)