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Updated: May 12, 2025
'Wounded? said the King in a whisper. 'Yes, wounded in the soul, and in the heart sick, sick, sick. Saphadin, kneeling down, kissed his ring. 'May the God whom in secret we both worship, the God of Gods, do well by you, my brother. So he said, and Richard nodded and smiled at him kindly. When peace was made they carried him to his ship. The fleet went to Acre.
My brother the Sultan would rather lose Jerusalem than have such a man to die. At this Richard opened his eyes. 'Eh, Saphadin, my friend, he says, 'death is not mine yet, nor Jerusalem either. Make me a truce with my brother Saladin for three years. Then with the grace of God I will come and fight him again. But for this time I am spent. 'Are you wounded, dear sire? asked Saphadin.
The Mussulmans were alarmed, and Saphadin gladly concluded a truce for six years. But the country was doomed to be soon deprived of the tranquillity afforded by a cessation of arms. Almeric and his wife being dead, Mary, the daughter of Isabella by Conrade of Tyre, was acknowledged Queen of Jerusalem; while Hugh de Lusignan, son of Almeric by his first wife, was proclaimed King of Cyprus.
The son of Saphadin felt his throne rendered insecure by the ambition or treachery of his own kindred, and was therefore much inclined to cultivate an amicable feeling with so powerful a prince as the sovereign of Germany.
And all the while the Turks ceased not to do all the mischief that they could, slaying such as strayed from the camp, yea, and coming into the camp itself, and doing men to death in their very tents, and Saladin, or rather Saphadin, his brother, for he it was who held converse with King Richard, when complaints were made of their deeds, affirmed that they were done by robbers and others who were not subject to him, and paid no reverence to his commands; of which pretence there need be said this only, that these robbers or murderers, whether they were the Caliph's men or no, never harmed any but such as were his enemies.
It was said that Richard proposed this plan, and that both Saladin and Saphadin evinced a willingness to accede to it, but that it was defeated by the influence of the priests on both sides.
Richard consented to open these negotiations, not knowing but that some terms might possibly be agreed upon by which Saladin would consent to restore Jerusalem to the Christians, and thus end the war. The messenger whom Saladin employed in these negotiations was Saphadin, his brother.
For a week he lay in his bed delirious, babbling breathless foolish things of Jehane and the Dark Tower, of the broomy downs by Poictiers, the hills of Languedoc, of Henry his handsome brother, of Bertran de Born and the falcon at Le Puy. Then followed a pleasant thing. Saladin, the noble foe, heard of it, and sent Saphadin his brother to visit him.
The plan was for Saladin and Richard to cease their hostility to each other, and become friends and allies; the consideration for terminating the war being, on Richard's side, that he would give his sister Joanna, the ex-queen of Sicily, in marriage to Saphadin; and that Saladin, on his part, should relinquish Jerusalem to Richard.
It was in consequence of the insuperable objections which arose against an absolute surrender of Jerusalem to the Christians that the negotiations took the turn which led to the proposal of a marriage between the ex-Queen Joanna and Saphadin; for, when Richard found that no treaty was possible that would give him full possession of Jerusalem, and the letters which he received from England made more and more urgent the necessity that he should return, he conceived the plan of a sort of joint occupancy of the Holy City by Mussulmans and Christians together.
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