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Steve Tibble, "Assassins and Templars: A Battle in Myth and Blood" (Yale UP, 2025)
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Marshall Po
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Dr. Miranda Melcher
Hello, and welcome to another episode on the New Books Network. I'm one of your hosts, Dr. Miranda Melcher, and I'm very pleased to welcome back onto the podcast Dr. Steve Tibble to tell us about his latest book, published by Yale University Press in 2025, titled Assassins and A Battle in Myth and Blood. Now, obviously, those words suggest that we're going back in time to sort of Crusader era. We're going to be talking about military history. To be honest, that's often a relatively niche area of history. Loads of cool stories as we've talked about before with Steve on the podcast, but not necessarily something that kind of everyone would be aware of, unless we're talking about the Assassins or the Templars, because this is the real history we're going to be talking about today behind some really popular things still in 21st century culture, like, for example, the video game Assassin's Creed. So this is the definitely proper history. This is definitely niche history to a degree. But this has resonance and probably interest to people who maybe wouldn't necessarily pick up a 800 page, massively footnoted book of which I can assure you this is not. This is very entertaining to read and I think it'll be quite fun to talk about as well. So, Steve, thank you so much for coming back onto the New Books Network to tell us about your latest work.
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Dr. Steve Tibble
Yeah, thank you, Miranda. It's lovely to be here again.
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Dr. Miranda Melcher
Could you please give us a bit of an introduction of yourself for listeners who maybe haven't heard your previous interviews with us and then tell us about this particular book project and how it came to be.
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Dr. Steve Tibble
Yeah, thank you. So my name is Dr. Steve Tibble. I write primarily about the Crusades in the Eastern Mediterranean in the Medieval world. I'm a graduate of Cambridge University and then did my PhD at London. I'm an honorary associate of Royal Holloway College, London University, and I mainly work at the moment. My books are mainly published by Yale University Press, who are a really lovely bunch and they do great, beautiful books that are really academically robust, but you know, they're the kind of books that you'd actually want to read rather than just have as a reference on your shelf. So, yeah, this is my latest book with them called Assassins and Templars. But it followed on from a. A book they published with me about 18 months ago called Crusader Criminals, which you can see the kind of linkage here. There's a whole kind of bad boy thread kind of going through my current work and well, I'm having great fun and I hope.
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Dr. Miranda Melcher
Yes, it definitely gives us rather a lot to discuss. Obviously today we're going to be talking about the Assassins and the Templars and the sheer fact that you've put both of them in the title suggests that there's some reason to talk about them in the sort of same breath. So let's start to get into what that might be. You discuss early in the book that there are ways in which we should understand these two organizations as being culturally similar. They're certainly both very intense and pretty cult like. Is that where we see the similarity?
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Dr. Steve Tibble
No, you're absolutely right. They, you know, they put the cult into culture. They are two very. Yeah, it's not unfair to say extreme groups. I mean, I don't like using words like radicalized or terrorist or whatever because that really just stops the conversation. It doesn't really examine anything in detail. But they both have cult like qualities and that is true, bizarrely, they have a huge amount of other things in common as well, things which I'd never even anticipated when I started looking at them. And to me, that was part of the really fun thing in writing the book, was to uncover these hidden relationships and look at it almost from an anthropological point of view. It's quite fun looking at what a bunch of human beings, faced with the same problems in broadly the same area, come up with. It's like SimCity. You give people a particular problem and you can just watch it playing out over time. The same strategies, same methodologies. Even though these were groups that, you know, ostensibly probably should have hated each other, should have had nothing in common, you know, quite the opposite. But. But bizarrely, because we all share common humanity and common problems and responses, they. They did act in often a very similar way and bounced off each other for what, 200 years and now, you know, through Assassin's Creed and. And the. The joys of Internet conspiracies. You know, they're. They're with us probably even more than ever. They're still rumbling through and through legend.
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Dr. Miranda Melcher
I think the bouncing off each other is definitely something we want to discuss more about because they are, of course, operating in the same place at the same time. But to get to that comparison, let's go into a bit more detail first about each of them individually. So starting with the assassins. How and why did they become assassins? What was the sort of context that they were operating in? And why was becoming sort of a small culti group that focused on this method of violence the way that they chose to survive?
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Dr. Steve Tibble
Yes, you're absolutely right. That's a very nice way of putting it. And when you put it like that, it does seem extreme, doesn't it? I mean, everything in what you've said cries out about, wow, this is a crazy journey. And I guess with hindsight, you're absolutely right. It is an extreme path. But for the guys at the time, you could see how you would gradually adopt that positioning. So we have to remember that Islam, like Christianity and like all religions, really has splits. You know, people splinter off and they form their own groups. So as you know, Islam split into two main groups, though clearly this is a massive oversimplification, but just for today's purposes. And one of the two main splits of Islam was into the Shia. Shia religion. And then there were various splits within Shiism, of course, one of which was Ishmaelism, which was the religion of the Fatimid Empire, the Egyptian Fatimid Empire, which controlled a lot of the Middle east in the time of the early Crusades. And in the 11th century. And then the Ishmaelis of Fatimid Egypt split. And one of those splits took place in 1094 when their Caliph, or potential caliph, a guy called Nizar, was killed. And his supporters, rather than just give up, fled to Persia where there was another big Ishmaeli community. So at that point you find. So this is like mid-1090s, you find the creation of this sect called Nizari Ismailis, you know, Nizari after their founder Nizar and Ishmael is because that's the branch of Islam they were following, but because they're a little group, you know, and I always think, you know, Monty Python here and, you know, Life of Brian Splitters, you know, they, they're, they're a split from a split from a split. They're deeply unpopular. Even, Even the other Ishmaelas, you know, the ones in, in Egypt, often, often go against them and you find that they, they end up killing each other. The particular hatred and the animosity comes from their Sunni neighbors. And Persia has been captured by the Turks, who are a Sunni branch of Islam. So they're hated, they're seen as heretics by their neighbors. They're seen as splitters by their old compatriots. So they're deeply, deeply unpopular. And I think you find that that tends to push people in on themselves. And there are, you know, with. And that's where some of the cult aspects come from. A small group that is persecuted, hated, despised turns in on itself slightly. And as you can see in, you know, various cultures in 20th century that they, they become more and more extreme, their means of survival become more extreme and they become much more inward. And I think that plays very strongly to your, you know, one of your opening remarks about, you know, the secretiveness of them. And it's, you know, it's easy to think of them as being secretive. And, you know, maybe that's just Hollywood or video games or whatever, but it's actually true. It is. It's one of the challenges of researching the, the Templars and, and the assassins, but particularly the assassins, is that they were very, very esoteric. And they, they did not advertise the, you know, they didn't open the lid, they didn't open the bonnet to let many people see the workings of, of their, of their religion, their cult. So, yeah, it's, it's challenging in many ways. I think one fun way of looking at it is, you know, why are they called assassins? You know, why, why aren't we talking about Nizari? Ishmaelis And I think the reason I use the word assassin, I mean, technically they should be called nizari ishmaelis, but everybody nowadays knows them as assassins. And actually even at the time, that was true for many, if not most of their compatriots. The term assassin is a derogatory term mainly developed by their Sunni enemies. So it literally means, as you'd expect, it's somebody who takes a lot of drugs, hashashin. And it wasn't meant literally. It can be meant literally as a drug taker, but it can also mean like a low life, you know, just rabble scum. So they used that as a way. The Sunnis used that as a way of denigrating them. And particularly when the assassins had a committed group, like a hit squad that would go to murder somebody, their enemies could rationalize that semi suicidal commitment by saying, well, okay, these guys were absolutely, you know, off, off their head. You know, they were taking drugs. Clearly they're not really religiously motivated. They're just, you know, narcotic drug users. So it's a way of denigrating them, which is actually terribly unfair as far as I can make out. There's, you know, there no significant drug use whatsoever. It really is just an insult. And actually, if you think about it, carrying out an assassination attempt on some of the world's most unapproachable people, which is basically what they did, you need all your wits about you. The very last thing you want is to be taking drugs, being completely full of narcotics and thinking to yourself, when am I going to find my next miles bar? Or you don't want them. You actually need to have all your senses at a fine point. So I think it's very unlikely that they genuinely were hashagin. But it's a name that stuck and.
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Dr. Miranda Melcher
It'S the name that we still have. And that explanation definitely does help make sense of the cultishness of this and the secretiveness of it. But I do have to ask, just because you're a cult and you're secretive and you're maybe hiding out from people who don't like you, you don't have to go around trying to kill really hard to kill people, right? Like, why was that chosen as the survival method? Even if you've got the secretiveness, even if you've got the cultiness, like, why then go that extra step?
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Dr. Steve Tibble
Yeah, no, you're absolutely right. I think it really comes back to their strategic situation and particularly for the assassins in Syria, which is what we're primarily talking about today. And that's mostly what, what the book is about. They, they're in an awful situation. So it's not, it's not just an abstract thing, you know, to say that they're an unpopular sect. If you, if you said that nowadays, that doesn't mean that, you know, the neighbors don't like you and you know, maybe don't talk to you in the street. In 12th century Syria, it means that people were going to hunt you down and kill you. It was a very visceral thing. And the Assassins were hugely outnumbered. So they're in Sunni controlled territory because most of the Muslim states are controlled by Turkic warlords who are at least nominally Sunni. You're completely surrounded. You're so outnumbered. It's not true. You know, you, you are very much on the precipice of destruction. So it's not, it's, we're not just talking about a PR campaign here. This is life or death. And faced with that life or death situation, you know, there's obviously there's a multiple set of ways that you can respond. You know, you can, you can roll over, you can try and hide, you can change your religion. I mean, there's many ways you can respond, but one way you can't respond is by responding in kind. And basically all of the big players in the Middle east in the time of the Crusades used to have big armies. That was how warfare was done. People went to enormous lengths and absolutely bankrupted themselves to import people from all mercenaries from all over the known world to have these gigantic, by the time, you know, by the standards of the time, armies, and these armies were colossal. And they were also very destructive for everybody. You know, they were a very blunt instrument. So if you have 10,000 cavalry, they're just wandering around, they're destroying villages, they're killing loads of people, they're bankrupting their employers, you know, and so on. It's, it's ghastly. But a small competitor can't compete. You know, they, what they can't do is field army of a hundred, you know, cavalry to face this army of 10,000. They would just be swept away. So I think this is the genius of the Assassins was to work out that they could get leverage by the commitment of their people. You know, one thing a cult does have is committed people. Otherwise, you know, it's almost self defining, they wouldn't be there. So they worked out that there were two things really. One is that a single person with a dagger in the right place at the right time can cause more More damage than one of those huge armies. They can really get to the heart of the enemy's political system. And the other thing that they worked out, which is another reason why we actually do relate them to the Templars, is that they were a corporation. Most of the big players, whether they're Crusaders or Turks or even on the Egyptian side, these are guys that, that they're run by men, they're run by men with families. And it's all very personal. If you kill the leader of your opposition, you know, a lot of, a lot of things happen. You really have exerted power over them. If you, if you're threatening to kill someone's wife or family or father, you know, then these things are deeply personal and people are very vulnerable. Even the most powerful Turkic warlord is, is intensely vulnerable in that way. So, so for them it was what we'd nowadays called asymmetrical warfare, which, which is sort of where you get the kind of easy repost of oh, well, they were a bunch of terrorists, you know, that kind of thing. I think from their perspective, they would say that they were fighting back against their oppressors in the only way that they could and that where they might try to dive in and kill one or two people, their opponents were, you know, wandering around the region killing thousands of people. So it's not as clear cut as, you know, good and bad terrorists, not terrorist. I think those kind of labels aren't actually that very helpful. And people who say that the assassins invented terrorism are, I think, slightly naive because, you know, I think political violence has existed, you know, as soon as two humans picked up sticks, you know, there's, there's always potential for that. And it's been around for as long as human societies have been. But yeah, no, in terms of strategy, you can see the logic behind it. And it kept them alive and playing in a very dangerous field for, you know, a couple of hundred years.
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Dr. Miranda Melcher
Well, I think the label there that we most want to pick up is corporation, because that is, as you've explained, exactly what's happening here and what the Templars are doing. And the Templars are, you know, in the same violent context, in the same challenge of there not being that many of them compared to some of the other actors running around. So what are some other similarities between what you've just told us about the assassins and the Templar's origin story and initial goals and how they developed their methods?
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Dr. Steve Tibble
Yeah, no, you're absolutely right. I mean, I wouldn't want to pretend that, you know, they're identical in any way. So. And I'm not trying to shoehorn people into fake comparisons, but it is shockingly apparent just how almost their strategies are running along tram lines, you know, because. Because they are faced with similar situations. And it is, it is that whole Sim City thing. So the Templars come out of the chaos and horror of the First Crusade. So the First Crusade wanders into the Holy Land and recovers Jerusalem and a lot of other places for Christianity. And at the end of the Crusade, everybody gets together and says, wow, that was great. That was really successful. We'll go back to Europe now. I haven't Seen, you know, I haven't seen the family in three or four years. I'll, I'll be off then. And, and bizarrely, that's what most of them did. So most of them, most of the first Crusaders treated what they'd done as a, as a, a violent pilgrimage, really. And you can get it, you can see that that's, in a sense, that's what Crusades is. It is a violent pilgrimage. But there is a bigger picture, which is to say, well, okay lads, that's fine, thanks very much. But we, you know, we now have to defend the Holy Land. It's not just a question of coming here once, saying prayers and then, and then going back to Europe. So the powers, the different Crusader states that were set up in the east and the papacy, who'd helped organize it, the crusading movement in the first place, had to find other mechanisms for creating standing armies and semi regular troops. Because, as you know, feudal Europe is very fragmented. It doesn't have regular armies or anything. So in a sense they're having to work incredibly quickly to try to create regular troops that haven't been seen in the area since the last Roman legions walked out, really. So they've, you know, they've got five or six hundred years of catch up. And one of the most important ways they did it were to create these orders of military monks, which again, obviously is a very ironic, you know, tense relationship because Christianity is ostensibly as pacifistic as you can imagine. So there's a lot of tension between violence and piety there. But the Templars are one of the ways and one of the military orders, in fact, the primary military order that became that standing army. So you find that in a sense they're a microcosm of the Crusader States. They're a relatively small number of people, hugely outnumbered, geographically surrounded. They're isolated because they're far away from Europe. It takes years for another crusade to come and help them if they get into an emergency. So they have it in a broad strategic sense. They're facing many of the similar problems. They're on the edge of a vast Islamic sphere of influence. They're unpopular, they're surrounded, they're outnumbered and so on. So they have many of the same issues. The response is again, very similar. You find the Assassins and the Nizari Ishmaelas come up with an elite group of hitmen, really, who, who are called the Fidaeus. So when, when we, in modern culture, you know, as in, you know, if you're playing a video game and assassin's Creed, say, and you've got an assassin that is technically a fidus. It's because of the Nizari Ishmaeli population. You know, most of the, most of the people would have been, you know, mothers or diplomats or merchants or peasants or whatever. Normal, normal people. It's just a tiny number of them that were this kind of elite strike force called the F and the Templars, you could imagine, in a similar sort of way. So they're always a relatively small number. I think, you know, any given point, there were never more than a few hundred brothers who, you know, fighting in terms of the Fidus, I'd be surprised if they got into three figures. Very much actually, you know, they, we're talking very tiny numbers of people here, but people who are hugely committed. And the Templars came to this effectively, intuitively came to the same conclusions as the Assassins did. So the Assassins knew that a, you know, an, a knife, a threat, the promise of death in the shadows could really take you a long way. You could really exert influence that way. You don't make friends, but you do influence people. And the Templars similarly, you know, they, they realized they were a tiny band of elite warriors and their way of exerting influence was a sort of the same, but opposite. So they're, you know, the, the, the, the leverage with a, with a, an assassin was you couldn't see them coming. The, the leverage with the template was you really could see them coming. You know, they basically just decided to identify by the standards normally banners, where the enemy were, where the enemy general was. And this tiny group of, of fanatical, hugely committed of Templars would, would charge right at that, that person. And that's was occasionally a disaster, but it was occasionally very, very successful because they're both parties were tiny groups of people that were very difficult to stop and that obviously, in terms of methodology, there's a very, very clear link there. They also operated in very similar areas. You know, they were. Which is one reason why we put the Templars and the Assassins in the same, in the title of the book and in video games, is that they were geographically bouncing off each other for the same reasons. Both of them realized that because they were so small in numbers, they needed to have castles. So they were both building castles furiously, particularly in quite isolated areas where they could, you know, seek protection and make. And also find a, find a place to regroup and become dangerous. So in the mountains around Lebanon, there's a mass of Templar and Hospitaller castles and they're facing off against again, a massive number of Assassin castles. And the two of them have this crazy kind of dance of death over the best part of 200 years. Sometimes they're very boring, prosaic relationships. They're landlords and tenants. Sometimes it's just gangsterism. The Templars habitually used to extort money from the Assassins. And you have to think, well, wow, you know, how crazy and dangerous do you have to be to blackmail the world's most dangerous people? But, but they did, and they got away with it for, you know, for a very long time. And they, and they both invested in these small number of highly committed young men, usually who were prepared to, to die for the cause. And I think also there's an interesting twist to that. We, we think, tend to think of them as all a bit suicidal, but that couldn't be further from the truth. The, the Assassins were a very, very, you know, scarce commodity. They were never a suicide squad. They were a highly dangerous squad of people who probably weren't coming back, but they always wanted to get back. And it's clear that they did look for an exit strategy. And it's the same with the Templars. You know, on the one hand, they embraced death, and a lot of their ideology is around martyrdom, but because they're Christians and obviously devout Catholics, you know, suicide is the last thing that they'd want. That's actually a mortal sin. So both had to tread this kind of fine line between commitment to death and the promise of death and being open to the possibility of death, but not actually wishing it and making it happen unnecessarily. So two extreme groups at the same time in the same place, operating on very similar methodologies. And I think it's just wonderful to see them do this. And it creates a lot of fabulous stories from a selfish point of view as a, as a book writer, you know, the kind of stories that these groups come up with are extraordinary.
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Dr. Miranda Melcher
And it's definitely, I think, also a good example of kind of the history is stranger than fiction sort of thing. Like, as you said, they really did have castles in the same sorts of mountains and really did kind of go up against each other in all sorts of different ways. The sort of things that, you know, if you said, oh, I'm going to have these two groups and I'm going to do these things, someone might go, oh, that wouldn't really happen. And it's like, no, actually, you're telling us the real history. And it did actually do that. But I wonder if we can talk a little Bit more about this sort of myth busting idea of the suicide squad that you're telling us is really not what was going on here. You've discussed the ways in which their methods are similar and I think that's quite clear. It sounds like their sort of branding is as well. Like it's not just what they were doing, it's what people thought they would do. Like none of this. Obviously the specifics might be secretive of where is the castle and how do you get into it, but the idea of like the Assassins are out there and if you do something they don't like, they're going to come after you. You know, the Templars are waiting across the other hill and like, beware. It's. That was part of the method here. Right. And was sort of this idea of martyrdom and commitment part of it as well, even if, as you said, they didn't actually all want to die?
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Dr. Steve Tibble
Yeah, no, you're absolutely right. I mean, there's, well, there's sort of three things there, really. I mean, partly is their conjoining, partly branding, but also, you know, how suicidal were they? I mean, in terms of conjoining, it is fabulous. You know, it's a book that almost writes itself and I did have a huge amount of fun with it. And the kind of, the danger is that it looks a bit like, you know, Aliens versus Predator. You know, it's got that kind of, you know, two icons bumping into each other. Obviously it's artificial, obviously it never happened. But the weird thing about Assassins and Templars, as you say, is it really did happen and not just once, you know, it was. You're talking about relationships spanning centuries or certainly. Yeah, centuries. But I think you also raised a very good point about branding and the sense in which a lot of this legend making is deliberate. And I think we can put modern labels on things like branding or PR campaigns and so on, and that's quite a, I think it's quite a useful way of understanding what they're doing, but that's not to trivialize what they did. You know, they didn't have that vocabulary, you know, they didn't have a kind of, you know, corporate identity or a brand strategy or whatever. But actually they both did, they just didn't. They were just intuitively brilliant at it. So, for instance, as we've talked about the, you know, the Assassins, even their, even their job title, even the title Assassin is a pejorative and. But it is larger than life. It is a fantastic title. You know, if you paid a branding Agency nowadays to come up with a title. You know, you certainly wouldn't, wouldn't regret the check writing, signing, the cheque once they came up with that, because it's got huge resonance. And some people nowadays, for very good reasons, very understandable reasons, you know, because Ishmaelas are not like the assassins were in the 12th and 13th century, but would now say quite, in a quite revisionist way. Oh no, the assassins weren't really like that. You know, they were very orthodox Muslims and that this is just a label that's put on them by their enemies, so you can't take it seriously. And, and there is an element of truth in that, of course, because it, it was, you know, effectively created by their enemies. But it's also obvious when you read the Ishmaeli sources, when you look, when you look at what the Nizarros wrote about themselves and the way they behaved, that they lean, you know, because as, as you were suggesting, really you, It's a kind of power that you can't buy. You know, it's a lot cheaper than buying a huge army is to have your enemy fear what, everything that you stand for. So you. I'm sure it was irritating at first, but then I, I do get the sense that they really embrace it and they realize that this promise of death, you know, the kind of the, the assassin brand that that has been created by their strategy and, and by their enemy's fear and anger and created something that's hugely powerful and they really lean into that and you find that even reflects in other things. They do. I mean, a lot of the leaders do behave strangely. They really do behave in ways that are deliberately arcane. You know, like they might not. Well, talking about Sinan again, who's a character in Assassin's Creed, but he was probably their greatest leader by far in Syria. I mean, he would very self consciously didn't allow people to see him eat. He let it be known that he was clairvoyant and psychic. He could answer questions without hearing the questions. He knew when people had died hundreds of miles away and so on. So there were deliberate steps to not behave as you would expect. When he went traveling around from one castle to the next, there were guys carrying huge axes in front of him. There was chanting going on. There was a lot of display and visual branding with it. But, but equally most importantly, you know, he's called the old man of the Mountain. I mean, again, what a great, what a great brand that is, you know, fantastic kind of labeling really. And, and again, it's it's part of the corporatism, you know, it's, it's what makes them different from all these vulnerable families. You know, so Sinan can be the old man of the mountain. He dies in 1193, you know, by, by the end of the week or whenever there's another old man of the mountain. It's almost like death itself doesn't disappear. It's just a continuation and it becomes effectively a job title. And you see, and you see a lot of resonance with that, with the Templars as well. And again, if you look at the visual God, you know, it's, it's a nightmare. If you type in Templars and look at images on, on the Internet, you get a wall of, of craziness. But you can see that the main elements of their visual branding were very, very powerful. But they, they too lean into their reputation for huge almost, you know, their opponents would say like mind mindless, crazy commitment to death. You know, that they're, they're prepared to die themselves and most obviously they're prepared to bring it to their enemies. And again they, they lean into that. I think there's quite a funny sort of slightly tongue in cheek modern equivalent which is, you know, I live not too far away from the Mormon play that's on the comedy play song, the Book of Book of Mormon, which I've seen a couple of times and it's fabulous. But you can see from the Mormon's perspective it's potentially a nightmare and they could have got really shirty about it. Instead you go to watch the Book of Mormon, you buy the program and there's, you know, there's the Latter Day Saints sort of advertising on page one. It's, it's fabulous because I think they very cleverly realized that there's no upside in fighting it. So you just lean into it and, and actually improve your image and get more power that way by, you know, by, by doing the right thing and embracing. For a limited time at McDonald's, get a Big Mac Extra Value meal for $8. That means two all beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun and medium fries. And a drink. We may need to change that jingle.
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- [36:13]
Dr. Miranda Melcher
And it certainly, in the case of the assassins, has such a lasting effect that the idea of the old men on the mountains is something we still have. Right. And that was going, you know, that was something I was wondering about. Going into this book was kind of. Is that a myth? Have we made that up more recently? But as you've been explaining to us, that's another one of these great history is stranger than fiction type things. I wonder, though, if we can talk a little bit about the potential trap maybe that we've both fallen into a little bit by accident. And I think we should put our finger on it and talk about it more explicitly, which is the idea that they fight each other, because, of course, they do fight each other a lot. It gives us all sorts of entertaining stories. But was it inevitable that they would fight each other? I mean, they had some enemies in common. You talk about in the book that they really both didn't. Like Saladin, for instance. They're both small groups. There's a lot of other violent actors in the same time and place. So, like, I don't know, could they have allied or stayed in separate spheres, or were they always going to fight?
- [37:14]
Dr. Steve Tibble
Yeah, yeah, no, that's. Well, I think you're absolutely right. Almost everything you've said there did actually happen, and it happened across a wide spectrum. So there were areas where they cooperated with the Crusaders and presumably with the military orders. There were areas where they just hated each other and killed each other mindlessly at every opportunity. And there was everything in between. I mean, so you do go from prosaic landlord tenant arrangements, you know, profit sharing for peasants, crop yields and, you know, stuff like that. But I think there was something was always going to happen. These, these are two extreme groups, you know, that is one reason why we're talking about them, really. So you've got these two extreme groups, same time, same place, but with very different proximate objectives, you know, so their ultimate objectives are very, very similar in some ways, as we've talked about. But, you know, clearly one is a sort of extreme Muslim sect, another is a extreme, arguably Christian sect. You know, so they're. So they've got everything in common and yet nothing. And that plays out in history. So there, there are many times when the assassins and the Crusaders got along absolutely fine. I think one, one of the big mistakes People make is, you know, we're a bit Eurocentric in the way we look at the past because we're European. So it's, you know, it's understandable, but it does distort. And looking at the assassin from that perspective, you might think, oh, they, you know, they wanted around killing a lot of Crusaders. They were clearly anti, anti Crusader, anti Christian. And actually that's really not true. I mean they did, there were occasional hits on Christian leaders, but that doesn't seem to be because of religion. It was either because somebody paid them to do it or because they were having a dispute about something. You know, it was that, that prosaic. And there were many times when, when they actually got on really well with the Crusaders. There were, you know, there was a big incident where they, where they were trying to create a principality for themselves and it wasn't working. And rather then give this principality, which is called Banias in the Glam Heights, rather than give it over to their Sunni enemies, they gave it over to the Crusaders who weren't great mates, but they were sort of fairly neutral, potentially allies. So the Crusaders came in, took it over. The leader of the assassins at that time died and he was actually buried in Banias and his, his grave became a shrine. So you have this kind of ironic thing where assassins were welcomed by the Crusaders to come and pray at the shrine of an assassin leader inside a Crusader castle. There was even a time, and maybe come back to this more later, when the Crusaders and the assassins were so close that there was talk of some kind of religious coming together. I think some people describe it as conversion. I really doubt it. But there was certainly, ironically, the assassins were much more theologically open minded than many of the Crusader Catholics or their Sunni opponents. And they certainly were quite well read in terms of Greek philosophy, for instance, and quite open minded about how that might proceed. So there were long periods of time when the assassins and the Crusaders were quite happily rubbing along together. And, and you can understand why, you know, not only, you know, they, they primarily have a shared enemy. And one reason why the assassins are so unpopular to the Sunni population is that they see them as heretics. Whereas for, for Catholic Crusaders, you know, it's like, well, I'm not really interested in that kind of stuff. You know, it's like if you're, if you're going to fight Saladin with me, then, you know, welcome aboard. And yeah, I think there was a much more practical aspect to the relationship than we might give them credit for. But on the other hand, you Also have, you know, two bunches of heavily armed nutcases who are potentially quite volatile. So you do find that the Templars and Assassins having some bloody encounters that just end in absolutely disaster for everybody.
- [41:31]
Dr. Miranda Melcher
I mean, something of everything. Right, is this what we're hearing here? It sounds like to some extent some of these similarities that we've been discussing were recognised kind of at the time. Or is that taking it too far? I mean, we definitely are seeing some things that are not just coming through in the later period, kind of looking back on them. But were there conversations happening at this point of like, oh, they're kind of the same, or even within the groups, like, here's where we can get along? Or was that sort of, given all the chaos of the context you've been telling us about, not so much the topic of conversation?
- [42:06]
Dr. Steve Tibble
Well, I think there's no evidence that I can think of immediately that the Templars and the Assassins sat down and had cups of tea and talked about ecumenical matters. That wasn't likely to happen too much. But certainly if you look slightly broader and look at the Crusaders, you find very prominent Crusader kings happily having discussions with. With the assassins. King Amalric, who was one of the major kings of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem in the 12th century, was really cozying up with them, and they were pretty much, you know, just ready to sign, you know, heads of agreement on a very detailed plan for an alliance between. Between the two bodies. So it was certainly no, you know, no sort of barriers to that. And King Louis, you know, St. Louis in the 13th century, sent envoys and presents and gifts which were reciprocated with the assassins and presumably with the same agenda. We don't really know the objectives of the talks, but there were extensive talks and, you know, Catholic friars were sent over and had extensive conversations with the old man of the mountain, read his library, were allowed into his bedroom, saw what books he was reading. I mean, you know, crazy intimate stuff that we know about. And that was all going along very amiably. And I think it comes back to your earlier point, which is that these were two sets of individuals who were facing very similar problems and more to the point, similar enemies. So they had as much to bring them together as they did to pull them apart.
- [43:44]
Dr. Miranda Melcher
Okay, yeah, that's definitely helpful to understand. Of course, the groups have not existed for a very long time now, so we should probably talk about kind of what led to their decline. I mean, we are talking roughly at the same time period that they're declining in the sort of first decades of the 1200s. What's going on to cause this? Is it similar reasons for both of them? What sort of takes them from the heyday to not so much.
- [44:10]
Dr. Steve Tibble
Yeah, no, you're absolutely right. And I think the beginning and end of both of these groups, because they're so iconic, it's easy to exaggerate the beginning and the end. So for instance, with things like Freemasonry or video games, you know, one reason why so attractive in the case of the Templars with Freemasonry is that you, you can imagine that they existed, you know, way back into the mists of time. Whereas in fact, you know, they, the Templars came into being in the early 12th century and then they disappeared in the early 14th century. And and similarly with the Assassins, they're so iconic that people assume they were around forever and you know, saying like something like Assassin's Creed. They're these kind of figures that transcend time and they can naturally they're an easy icon to have in a game that looks amongst other things at time travel in a fantasy way. So that's the context you're always dealing with an unrealistically extended context. But it is interesting. They were both born at about the same time, end of the 11th century, beginning of the 12th. They were born into the same circumstances and they both went into decline and fall for very much the same reasons around about between 150 and 200 years later. And the key to that, the fact that they were both moving in parallel was that their enemies were the same. So the crusaders in the 13th century came increasingly under pressure from the huge Ayurvedic Mamluk Mongol armies. And again from a Eurocentric perspective, we think of the Crusades and this still being the Crusades, whereas in reality, I think the only reason they were still there for most of the 13th century was that the really important players, the Mamluks and the Mongols and Ayyubids had better things to do. They were there almost because they were pawns between the bigger players and the Assassins and Templars both suffered from the same thing. We find the Assassins brand is fantastic because they should have just been swept aside. You know, they are the most potentially powerless, tiny unpopular group. They should have been swept away. And all the other groups that we're not talking about were swept away. So we're talking about the kind of evolutionary survivor here, you know, so it's kind of self defining. But eventually, you know, their brand of fear was powerful, but eventually they were overcome by other players who had an even stronger brand of fear. So you find in the 1250s, the Mongols erupt into the Middle east. And from an assassin's point of view, initially in the same way as crusaders, many crusaders thought the same. They thought this might be an opportunity. Anybody who's killing this many Sunni Muslims can't be all bad. That was their kind of starting point. But they quickly had a falling out with the Mongols and made the mistake of killing one of the Mongols generals because that was, that was their normal way of intimidating their enemies. The trouble was the Mongols were not people you could intimidate. They are, you know, they're just really, really scary people and there are, you know, a lot of them and they just petrify the region and they, they are the opponents that the, that the assassins in Persia just can't beat. And they, they just trash all of the assassins castles in Persia and kill the last old man of the mountain there. In 1260, the Mongols are beaten by the Mamluks. So you know, the assassins in Syria might say, oh well, brilliant, yeah, the Mongols are finally gone. But then the Mamluks under their incredibly ruthless Sultan Baibars turn out to be just the same, if not worse, you know, and after that point, all the assassins, their castles are either taken away or destroyed. And the assassins of the community are only allowed to exist when they play ball and when they commit murder on behalf of their Sunni warlords. So ironically, they turn into kind of, you know, patsies in the end for the very people that, that hate them and who they hate. So it's, it's a rather sad ending for the assassins, but it's understandable. It's that same trajectory of projecting fear, but then ultimately being beaten by people who are impervious to it and can threaten even greater fear. And you find the Templars are going through that same arc almost at the same time. So they have this sort of power in the 12th century to an extent. But then as people like Saladin manage to unify the Sunni Islamic world that surrounds them, they're increasingly bit part players and they're more and more struggling as the 13th century goes on. And effectively all the military orders, but particularly the Templars, have one job to do and that is save the Holy land. And in 1291, the last remnants of the Holy Land are lost. So effectively the Templars are redundant. And then within 20 years or whatever, they are rounded up and suppressed and accused of the most outlandish crimes of, you know, Satanism, devil worship, treasure hunting. I mean, all Sorts of crazy things. Not. I don't believe any of it's true. But the problem was that they were redundant, like the Assassins. You know, they no longer had a brand that exerted fear. They no longer had a legitimate, plausible role, and they were just snuffed out. But I think the big but that covers both of them is that it's sort of homage to the power of branding. You know, these are two tiny groups. They lived for, you know, whatever it is, 150, 200 years, played a tough game with it, with, you know, very well, but were ultimately beaten. But we're still talking about them because the power of their brand, the kind of the crazy commitment that they had and the devotion and the way they projected themselves was so powerful that they have huge resonance for pretty much every generation of humanity that follows.
- [50:21]
Dr. Miranda Melcher
Yeah, it's definitely pretty amazing to think about that sort of ending point and yet still here having this conversation. And one of the reasons, of course, that this is still something that people are aware of is because of the video game we've been discussing throughout this, and we have kind of mentioned it in a number of places, Assassin's Creed. But I wonder, as we come to the end of our discussion about the book, kind of your, I suppose, evaluation of it as a historian that's gotten into all of these proper sources in detail, big picture sort of evaluation of probably the most famous way that people come across this material usually.
- [50:55]
Dr. Steve Tibble
Yeah, no, that's a very good point. I mean, ironically. And this just shows how stupid I am, really. I mean, I think people assume that I wrote this book. This book basically is the true history or the true backstory of the classic, original Assassin's Creed. And I think people assume that that's what I set out to write. You know, quite rightly. Why wouldn't you? In reality, I was. I was writing a lot about the Assassins because I was writing a book on crusader criminals. I'd just written a book on the Templars in Britain, so all of the material was there. And I kind of wrote this. I've half written it by accident, really, and really does prove how stupid I am, because I love games, love Assassin's Creed, play with toy soldiers, you know, So I do all the game stuff and I do history, and. But I'd never really put two and two together. I always assumed Assassin's Creed was fantasy, which it is, but I always assumed it was pure fantasy. And although it has a couple of obvious historical figures like Saladin, Richard the Lionheart, I thought that was just it. There's a kind of like the name on a counter. But the more I started to study the history and looked at what was going on between the two, I mean, the relationships between the Assassins and the Templars are so intricate that you can see why they create a great backdrop for Assassin's Creed. So to your point about how would a historian evaluate Assassin's Creed, I would say, well, it almost is not a fair comparison. Assassin's Creed does not. It's not a history lecture. It doesn't pretend to be true. It's a fantasy game. It's an entertainment. And, you know, it's a very powerful, popular, attractive video game that ticks all of those kind of boxes. So I wouldn't want to criticize it for not being something that it never sets out to be. I think to me, that obviously it isn't a work of history. So, you know, and it's a lot of. It is founded around potential conspiracy theories over many time periods and so on between the Assassins and Templars. And it does play off certain realistic characters. So Sinan has a role in the game and in history. Robert Sable, the Templar master at the time, has a role in the game and in history. He was, yeah, a very, very important figure on the Third Crusade and, you know, as does Richard and Saladin and so on. So there's a historical motif and there's a great visualization of the terrain and the culture and the world. So it's got a feel of authenticity, you know, if you're walking around Masyaf or Acre or Jerusalem or whatever. I think it's a great way of bringing those things to life in the same way as the, you know, like the Ridley Scott film Kingdom of Heaven, which I love, actually, because it's so beautiful. It's not. It's not. It's not great history, but it's not meant to be great history. It's. It's a great film. So I. I would say that I enjoy it for what it's good at and I wouldn't criticize it for what it never set out to be. And I think it does a great job of introducing a lot of people to a period of history and to groups of individuals that they wouldn't really have encountered otherwise.
- [54:08]
Dr. Miranda Melcher
And obviously a period of history that you've spent rather a lot of time in with this book and as you've mentioned, your previous work as well. So as a final question, I'm curious, are you staying in this period of history for your next project or anything on the horizon? You want to give us a sneak preview of?
- [54:24]
Dr. Steve Tibble
Yes. Well, actually, I've got two books underway for Yale at the moment, which I hopefully will finish by the end of the. Of 2026. In a very legal sense. I've got contracts, so I will be doing that. One of them is still under wraps, but the other one is History of the Hospitallers. So in a sense, it's looking at the other main military order, the other hugely committed people on the Christian crusader side, just to chart out what they do. But I'm doing that in conjunction with my friend Rory McClellan, who's an academic who specializes in the hospitals and Templars, and we're doing it across the whole of history. I think partly inspired by, you know, seeing how the Templars change so much over time in terms of image. We're. We're writing it right from inception up to the Cold War, and. And, yeah, I mean, actually, the hospital is bizarrely, as a. As a crusader military order did technically have an air force in the Cold War, but you have to read the book to find out the story behind that. But like, the Templars, they're just crazy guys. Great stories. And I did my PhD primarily around the Hospitallers, so for me, it's a bit of a homecoming. You know, I love the guys. They're the kind of marginally less crazy but more successful version of the military orders.
- [55:46]
Dr. Miranda Melcher
Well, for any readers who want to get into all of these sorts of stories, of course you can read the book we've been discussing titled Assassins and A Battle in Myth and Blood, published by Yale University Press in 2025. Steve, thank you so much for coming back onto the New Books Network.
- [56:00]
Dr. Steve Tibble
Thank you, Miranda. It's lovely talking to you.