The Third Crusade: An eye-witness account of the campaigns of Richard Coeur-de-Lion in Cyprus and the Holy Land (By Unknown)

(I promised a three-part series on rich people, but that can wait. Because I found The Third Crusade).

There’s something slightly thrilling about an authorless work, and while historians have speculated for centuries, all that is certain (as of the 1950s) is that a 12th French century monk wrote the original manuscript and that it was translated several times over the centuries. This particular edition was translated by Kenneth Fenwick who seems to have done a rather good job indeed. Our nameless hero traveled to the Holy Land for God and Country as part of the Third Crusade, which was an attempt by the Christian to reconquer the Holy Land from Saladin. It did not work. (Look up “The Fourth Crusade.” Which did not work. So look up “The Fifth Crusade.” Which did not work. So look up “The Sixth Crusade.” Etcetera, etcetera.)

In the year of the Incarnate Word of our Lord 1187… the Lord’s hand fell heavily on His people, if indeed it is right to call those ‘His people’ whom uncleanness of life and habits, and the foulness of their vices, had alimented from his favor. Their licentiousness had indeed become so flagrant that they all of them (casting aside the veil of shame) rushed headlong in the face of day into sin.

That is the sort of language that can be expected here. So it is a dense but fascinating volume. Full of violence and holy things. Also, the authoring monk is a racist, jaded and unfeeling bastard, which can be rather amusing at times, though I might just be assuming he’s unfeeling because the narrative style is rather “Here’s what happened. And then this happened next. And this happened after that.” They weren’t as into character development back in the day. Fully illustrated with strangely colored 50s woodblocks. Really quite a beautiful volume.

A cloud of dust obscured the air as our men marched on and, in addition to the heat, they had an enemy pressing them in the rear, insolent, and rendered obstinate by the instigation of the Devil. Still, the Christians proved good men and, secure in their unconquerable spirit, kept constantly advancing, while the Turks threatened them without ceasing in the rear; but their blows fell harmless upon the defensive armor, and this caused the Turks to slacken in courage at the failure of their attempts, and they began to murmur in whispers of disappointment, crying out in their rage that our people were of iron and would yield to no blow.

Fenwick, Kenneth (translator). The Third Crusade. London: Folio Society. 1958.

Seven Thousand Words Often Mispronounced (By William Henry P. Phyfe, member of the American Philological Assosciation; Member of the Spelling-Reform Assosciation; Author of “The School Pronouncer,” Based on “Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary”; “How Should I Pronounce? Or the Principles of the Art of Correct Pronunciation: A Manual for Schools, Colleges, and Private Use”; Etc., Etc.)

For the anal-retentive man who has everything, Seven Thousand Words Often Mispronounced: A Complete Hand-Book of Difficulties in English Pronunciation Including an Unusually Large Number of Proper Names and Words and Phrases From Foreign Languages.

Interestingly, it’s dedicated to Edwin Booth, whose accurate and scholarly pronunciation of the English language has been to the American people for over a generation a model of excellence and grace. Edwin is John Wilke’s brother. He was very famous for playing Hamlet. (Polonius. – What do you read, my lord? Hamlet. – Words, words, words.)

So um… horribly exciting. I had some cool stuff about steam engines. But I cannot find them. Five-hundred pages of phonetic spellings did seem awfully Victorian to me, however.

Phyfe, William Henry P. Seven Thousand Words Often Mispronounced. New York and London: G.P. Putnam’s Sons Knickerbocker Press. 1891.