"Paris in the fall, the last months of the year, at the end of the millenium. The city holds many memories for me, of music, of cafes, of love, and of death."
The Knights Templar have a greater mystique since they were suppressed, and revived only by fiction writers from Umberto Eco to Dan Brown; but to me the Knights Hospitaller are in some ways more impressive for managing to hang on to their state-without-a-country status for so long as the
Sovereign Military Order of Malta. They even had a substantial air force at one point as part of a scheme to circumvent treaty restrictions on Italy.
I highly recommend Roger Crowley's Empire of the Sea to anyone who wants to read about Malta in the 1500s when it was a key in the battle for the Mediterranean between the Ottomans and various European forces in various alliances (or not)
Man, you really have to listen to those lyrics more carefully. "Oh Mr Crowley did you talk to the dead" ... "You fooled all the people with magic. Waiting on Satan's call"
And if you want to read more about how the curse unfolded, have a lot of time to spare and can either read French or get your hands on a suitable translation, Maurice Druon's "Les Rois Maudits" is the epic multi-volume tale of a medieval dynasty's decline that you'll want to read.
Which is one of the influence of G.R.R Martin for A Song of Ice and Fire (GoT). Not for the dragon part, but rather the constant feuds and betrayals between noble families.
What is interesting is that even if is fiction, most of the main characters have existed and are more or less historically accurate.
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[ 3.4 ms ] story [ 65.1 ms ] threadI highly recommend Roger Crowley's Empire of the Sea to anyone who wants to read about Malta in the 1500s when it was a key in the battle for the Mediterranean between the Ottomans and various European forces in various alliances (or not)
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3418555-empires-of-the-s...
Who the fuck do you think we are thinking about in this context. Frank Crowley the farmer?
/s
I suspect that ain't the historian. ;)
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/918095.The_Religion
0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broken_Sword:_The_Shadow_of_th...
Highly recommended!
What is interesting is that even if is fiction, most of the main characters have existed and are more or less historically accurate.