← Back to the front page

Historic Groups that Started Innocent then Took an Evil Turn

Khalid Elhassan November 8, 2020 32 min

Harley-Davidson - Harley-Davidson WLA — Harley-Davidson WLAs. Motorcyclist

16. The Assassins Even Managed to Scare Off the Middle East’s Most Famous Figure

The most famous Order of Assassins’ target to be intimidated instead of murdered was Saladin, leader of the revived Islamic resistance against the Crusades. After retaking Jerusalem from the Crusaders in 1187, Saladin marched on the Assassins, who had murdered his predecessor, and sought to end the cult once and for all.

However, while encamped with his army near the Assassins’ holdfasts in the mountains of northern Syria, Saladin awoke in his tent one morning to discover that the cultists had bypassed all his bodyguards and layers of protection. They left a menacing letter pinned to his pillow by a poisoned dagger, advising the sultan that they could kill him whenever and wherever they wanted. Saladin turned his army around, abandoned the campaign, and sent officials to negotiate an understanding with the current Old Man of the Mountain. Via such means, a grudging live-and-let-live relationship developed between the Assassins and the region’s powers.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.