Crusade Against the Grail - Rennes-le-Chateau Research and ...

PARSIFAL 19
"When will it happen?" asked Richard the Lionheart.
"Seven years after taking Jerusalem."
"So, have we come too early?"
"Your coming was necessary, King Richard. God will give you victory
over your enemies, and will make your name glorious. Regarding the
Antichrist, he is among us, and soon he will sit on the throne of Peter."
Richard the Lionheart never liberated Jerusalem. Saladin triumphed for
a long period. And as for the Antichrist: Who can say that Joachim's
Antichrist was not Innocent III?
Philip and Richard left Sicily in the springtime. On Cyprus, Richard
married off his favorite troubadour, Peire Vidal of Toulouse, to a Greek
captive of high birth. Thanks to Michel de la Tour's biography, we know
just how much royal grace influenced the life of Peire.
The Crusade was a disaster. Frederick Barbarossa drowned in the
Saleph, the same river where Alexander the Great was almost killed.
Although Philip and Richard the Lionheart managed to take the city of
Akkon in July 1191 after a siege that lasted almost two years, disagreements
regarding the sharing of the booty, jealousy of Richard's popularity,
and a supposed illness induced the King of France to return to Europe after
the city's fall. For the crusaders who remained, Philip's departure was
tantamount to desertion, and the troubadours' satires accompanied him
across the sea.
A year later, Richard learned that Philip was trying to take Normandy
and Anjou, and that his brother was set on taking the crown of England
from him. With no time to lose, he decided to start negotiating with Saladin
in order to return as soon as possible to his country. He agreed with the
sultan that his sister Joan should marry the emir Malek-Adel, Saladin's
brother, and that together they should reign over Jerusalem and the Holy
Land. The Roman prelates were able to thwart this plan, which would have
put an end to the bloodshed in Palestine. The two rulers were only able to
sign a cessation of hostilities for three years, three months, and three days.
For such an auspicious occasion, Saladin and Richard organized grandiose
festivities. Both monarchs and their troops fought bloodless competitions
with lance and harp.
Saladin also brought with him his court poets because from the