Richard the lionhearts biography youtube

Saladin, having failed to stop Richard through the use of harassing tactics, had finally decided to bring the crusader host to battle. On the advice of two of his most trusted emirs, he settled on the plateau outside the town of Arsuf as the place where this potentially decisive battle should take place.

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On September 7, a few hours after King Richard had had his men break camp and resume their march on Jaffa, Saladin ordered his army to attack. Suffice it to say, that after enduring several hours of attacks by mounted and unmounted archers, the Crusaders finally launched a cavalry charge that caught the Ayyubids by surprise and sent them into a headlong retreat.

The tide of battle then ebbed and flowed as each side counter-attacked in turn. Given the outcome, the Battle of Arsuf has sometimes been judged as one of the greatest victories of the crusades. And how should we go about assessing battles like this in the first place? In the remainder of this column, I will attempt to answer these questions.

Specifically, I will evaluate the Battle of Arsuf on three levels: the tactical having to do with individual and small unit fighting techniques , the operational having to do with the way individuals and small units are organized and employed to fight a battle , and the strategic having to do with the way in which battles are used to realize overall campaign objectives.

On the tactical and operational levels, Richard and his crusader host won a clear and unambiguous victory at Arsuf. The Franks, being more heavily armed and armored than their Ayyubid opponents, favored the cavalry charge.