Episode 96: Saladin and the Leper King

In this episode Saladin cements his hold over the Near East by subduing Damascus, Aleppo, and Mosul. Then he turns his attention to the Crusader State: the Kingdom of Jerusalem. Meanwhile, the death of King Amalric in his early thirties results a child succeeding to the throne in Jerusalem. The young Baldwin IV would live a tragic life and suffer from leprosy throughout his short reign. His death would then lead directly to the devastating crusader defeat at the Horns of Hattin and the fall of the Kingdom of Jerusalem. Saladin would emerge from these decades as the undisputed ruler of the Near East. 

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A fast-moving history of the western world from the ancient world to the present day. Examine how the emergence of the western world as a global dominant power was not something that should ever have been taken for granted. This podcast traces the development of western civilization starting in the ancient Near East, through Greece and Rome, past the collapse of the Western Roman Empire into the Dark Ages, and then follows European and, ultimately, American history as the western world moved into a dominant world position.