The Monks of War

First published in 1972, this history follows the principal military religious orders of the Middle Ages: the Knights Templar, the Knights Hospitaller, the Teutonic Knights, and the Spanish orders of Santiago, Calatrava, and Alcantara. Seward traces their founding in the Crusader states, their rule that joined monastic vows to mounted warfare, their castles and banks, and their later roles in Prussia, Rhodes, Malta, and the Reconquista. He treats suppression, scandal, and survival as well as battle. The book is a group history of warrior monks, not a theology of crusading.

Bound in design blocked cloth. Black slipcase.