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IMC 2004: Sessions

Session 504: Languages of Love and Hate, I: First Crusaders, First Impressions, 1100-1200

Tuesday 13 July 2004, 09.00-10.30

Sponsor:SSCLE: Society for the Study of the Crusades and the Latin East
Organisers:Matthew Bennett, Department of Communication & Applied Behavioural Science, Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst
Susan B. Edgington, Department of History of Science & Technology, Open University
Sarah Lambert, Department of Historical & Cultural Studies, Goldsmiths College, University of London
Moderator/Chair:Alan V. Murray, Institute for Medieval Studies, University of Leeds
Paper 504-aCrusaders in a Hall of Mirrors: Robert the Monk's Depiction of Christians and Saracens in the Historia lherosolimitana
(Language: English)
Carol Elizabeth Sweetenham, University of Warwick
Index terms: Crusades, Language and Literature - French/ Occitan, Language and Literature - Latin, Mentalities
Paper 504-bPagans and 'Others' in the Chanson de Jerusalem
(Language: English)
Susan B. Edgington, Department of History of Science & Technology, Open University
Index terms: Crusades, Language and Literature - French/ Occitan, Mentalities
Paper 504-cThe Refusal to Convert: Tolerated Otherness in Old French Literature
(Language: English)
Marianne J. Ailes, Wadham College, University of Oxford
Index terms: Crusades, Language and Literature - French/ Occitan, Mentalities
Abstract

The arrival of the First Crusaders in the East, around 1100, faced them with Islamic communities, first as enemies then as subjects. The Latin Christians seem to have viewed these 'Saracens' as mirror opposites of themselves and created fantasies of them as heroes, lovers and ready souls for conversion. These examinations of Latin and Old French texts consider how these representations match reality and wished-for outcomes in the actual cultural clash.