This is the second part of a two-part enquiry. You can find lesson 1 here.
They re-establish Steve Runicorn’s interpretation and are introduced to the idea that this historian’s view was a re-thinking of the Crusades.
You then introduce your class to 11 different scholars and historians who have written about the Crusades since the 16th century, including Voltaire, Gibbon and Walter Scott.
Your students, sort the scholars into chronological order and then plot each scholar on a living graph. They look to see if each scholar thought that the Crusaders were heroic and important or cruel, pointless or bloodthirsty.
Next you introduce them to bigger themes in historiography including the Renaissance, the Enlightenment and the Romantic Period. They plot these periods on their graphs. This allows them to see the context in which the historians were writing in and helps them to explain why they interpreted the Crusades as they did.
After discussing this, your students are armed and ready to answer the enquiry question. Nice!
Download lesson
- Lesson presentation: PowerPoint
- Lesson write-up: PDF
- Resource 1-2: PDF
- W.S1: PDF
