History

Ego sum via veritas et vita is a Latin phrase from the Bible that can be translated in English as "I am the way, the truth, and the life." This phrase appears in John 14:6, which in the King James Version of the Bible reads "Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me." I have always liked this phrase because it is easy to understand, historically relevant, and was one of the first Latin phrases I committed to memory.

The reign of the Byzantine emperor Manuel Komnenos marked the high point of the Komnenian restoration. Like any emperor worthy of the position, he faced many challenges. One of these challenges thrust upon him was the Second Crusade. Further challenges were presented when dealing with the Latin principalities of the Levant and the Muslim powers of the East. Diplomacy with each party created a precarious situation because certain actions could be interpreted by the Latins as a betrayal of the crusading ideal.

Marcus Aurelius was born into a respected but not particularly famous patrician family in 121 AD. His birthplace was the small town of Ucubi in the Roman province of Baetica; his parents were Annius Verus and Domitia Lucilla.

In 1204 Latin Crusaders captured and sacked Constantinople, the Christian center of power in the East and capital of the Byzantine Empire, and established the Latin Empire of Constantinople. Historians have exerted a great deal of effort in an attempt to explain precisely how and why the crusade ended up in Constantinople, a city that was unrelated to the perceived goal of the crusade.

Peter Abelard was a French theologian and philosopher who lived from 1079 to 1142. He was born in Brittany into a noble family, and due to his exceptional intellectual ability, he pursued an academic career rather than a military one as was customary for a man of his social standing.1 During his career he studied under both the nominalist Roscelin and the realist William of Champeaux.

Mormons first came to Missouri as part of a mission in early 1831. They came to preach to the Native Americans who resided in “Indian Country” just west of Independence, Missouri. A federal Indian agent eventually forced these missionaries to leave Indian lands, and that summer Joseph Smith led a group of Mormons to Independence in order to meet with the missionaries. It was here that Joseph Smith claimed to receive a revelation from God that designated a site near Independence as the temple lot for the New Jerusalem.

Carrie Nation was an important leader in the temperance movement of Pre-Prohibition America. She advocated complete abstinence from alcohol and used militant tactics such as attacking saloons, often with a hatchet, to spread her message. Nation and her use of a hatchet were so well-known that she was able to sell souvenir hatchets to help pay her many fines, and she often carried her hatchet during public appearances.

You may want to acquaint yourself with the events of the Fourth Crusade before reading this review.

Many historical accounts about the crusader states during the late 12th century tell the story of how Raynald of Châtillon, capricious lord of Transjordan, captured Saladin's sister in a raid on a caravan owned by Saladin, the Ayyubid sultan who controlled the lands of Egypt and Syria surrounding the crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem. Despite the propagation of this story, it is considered false by the scholarly community.