Conor Kostick – författare

The crusades are often seen as epitomising a period when hostility between Christian West and the Muslim Near East reached an all time high. As this edited volume reveals, however, the era was one which saw both conflict and cohabitation.Tackling such questions as whether medicinal and architectural innovations came to Europe as a direct result of the Crusades, and why and how peace treaties and intermarriages were formed between the different cultures, this distinguished group of contributors reveal how the Holy Wars led on the one hand to a reinforcement of the beliefs and identities of each side, but on the other to a growing level of cultural exchange and interaction. This volume breaks new ground in not only exploring the conflict between the Christian and the Muslim worlds, but also the impact of this conflict on the cultural evolution of European and Near Eastern thought and practices. Utilising the latest scholarship and original studies of the sources, this survey sheds new light on the cultural realities of East-West relations and marks a new departure for studies of the crusades. Contributors include John France, Yehoshua Frenkel, Chris Wright, Natasha Hodgson, A.V. Murray, Sini Kangas, Léan Ní Chléirigh, Susan Edgington, Jürgen Krüger, Yvonne Friedman and Bernard Hamilton.

The crusades are often seen as epitomising a period when hostility between Christian West and the Muslim Near East reached an all time high. As this edited volume reveals, however, the era was one which saw both conflict and cohabitation.Tackling such questions as whether medicinal and architectural innovations came to Europe as a direct result of the Crusades, and why and how peace treaties and intermarriages were formed between the different cultures, this distinguished group of contributors reveal how the Holy Wars led on the one hand to a reinforcement of the beliefs and identities of each side, but on the other to a growing level of cultural exchange and interaction. This volume breaks new ground in not only exploring the conflict between the Christian and the Muslim worlds, but also the impact of this conflict on the cultural evolution of European and Near Eastern thought and practices. Utilising the latest scholarship and original studies of the sources, this survey sheds new light on the cultural realities of East-West relations and marks a new departure for studies of the crusades. Contributors include John France, Yehoshua Frenkel, Chris Wright, Natasha Hodgson, A.V. Murray, Sini Kangas, Léan Ní Chléirigh, Susan Edgington, Jürgen Krüger, Yvonne Friedman and Bernard Hamilton.

A vivid and entertaining guide to the events and locations of the Easter 1916 Rising.Defying all the odds 1600 men, women and children went out on 24 April, Easter Monday, 1916 to fight for an independent Ireland. The battle raged for six days and resulted in the destruction of many parts of Dublin city.The bloody executions of the leaders by the British after the Rising awakened a generation to the cause of Irish freedom.Vividly illustrated, this book takes you through the battle-torn streets of Dublin. Hear the sounds, smell the gunpowser and meet the main players, as the complexities of this dramatic episode in Irish history are explained in an accessible and concise fashion.

#WELCOME TO EPIC: PRESS START TO PLAY#.On New Earth, Epic is not just a computer game, it's a matter of life and death. If you lose, you lose everything; if you win, the world is yours for the taking.Seeking revenge for the unjust treatment of his parents, Erik subverts the rules of the game, and he and his friends are drawn into a world of power-hungry, dangerous players. Now they must fight the ultimate masters of the game -- The Committee. But what Erik doesn't know is that The Committee has a sinister, deadly secret, and challenging it could destroy the whole world of Epic.

How do we know we are real and not just some character in an elaborate game?In the virtual world of Saga, Ghost is a fifteen-year-old airboarding anarcho-punk, with no past, no memories, only a growing realisation of her own strange abilities. But who is she really and why is she becoming embroiled in a battle with the warped leader of Saga -- the Dark Queen? How have Erik and Cindella Dragonslayer fared since their adventures in Epic?And what happens if you dare to reach outside your world, or to question your identity? Is that simply the road to madness, death and destruction?Praise for Epic, Cindella Dragonslayer's first adventure: 'The most important Irish novel of the year.' Sunday IndependentSee the thrilling video trailer created for Saga by the US publisher, Viking Children's Books:

The coming of the Normans to Ireland from 1169 is a pivotal moment in the country’s history. It is a period full of bloodthirsty battles, both between armies and individuals. With colourful personalities and sharp political twists and turns, Strongbow’s story is a fascinating one.Combining the writing style of an award-winning novelist with expert scholarship, historian Conor Kostick has written a powerful and absorbing book about the Normans in Ireland, and the stormy affairs of an extraordinary era.

From a staunchly Republican family, Michael O’Hanrahan’s outwardly quiet and serious demeanour concealed a burning desire to see an independent Ireland. He was instrumental in setting up the first branch of the Gaelic League in Carlow. Michael also helped found the workingman’s club in Carlow, which he left when they decided to admit a British soldier. After moving to Dublin, he played important roles in both Sinn Fein and the Irish Volunteers. As quartermaster of the Volunteers, he was responsible for the procurement of many of the arms used in the Easter Rising. Michael O’Hanrahan was also a talented journalist and novelist whose development was cut short by his execution in 1916.In this new biography Conor Kostick brings to life a man who helped launch the 1916 Rising.

This book offers a fascinating insight to the final siege of the First Crusade. The most extraordinary siege in medieval history began with the arrival of a Christian army at Jerusalem on the dawn of 6 June, 1099. There were other sieges that lasted longer, involved greater numbers of troops and deployed more siege engines, but nothing else in the entire medieval period compares to the extraordinary journey that the besiegers had made to get to their goal and the heady religious enthusiasm among the troops. This was the culmination of the First Crusade, a military pilgrimage that had seen hundreds of thousands of men, women and children leave their homes in Western Europe, march for three years over thousands of miles and undergo tremendous hardship to reach their longed-for goal: Jerusalem.No other medieval army had made such a journey to reach its goal. And no other army had such a peculiar makeup. There were hundreds of unattached poor women, gathered from the margins of Northern French towns by the charity of the charismatic preacher Peter the Hermit and given a new direction to their lives by the expedition to Jerusalem.There were farmers who had sold their land and homes, put all their belongings in two-wheeled carts and marched alongside their oxen. Bards came and earned their keep composing songs about the events they were witnessing, from the heroic charges of the nobles to bawdy satires on the lax behaviour of some of the senior clergy. Knights and foot soldiers were at the heart of the fighting forces, naturally. But even here there was a strange fluidity to the army, with the status of a warrior rising or falling depending on his ability to keep his horse alive and his armour in good order.Here is a vivid and engaging account of the events of that siege: the key figures, the turning points, the spiritual beliefs of the participants, the deep political rivalries and the massacre of the inhabitants that left such a deep scar in the horrified imagination that it still evokes passionate feelings nearly a thousand years later.

The years from the Easter Rising in 1916 to the ending of the Civil War in 1923 were years full of drama and of fast-changing events, whose outcome shaped Irish society for generations. The conventional narrative of this period is one that focuses on the efforts of the nationalist politicians of various hues and the military activities of the IRA in their struggle to escape the British Empire. But these were also years of extraordinary popular initiatives, directed against both the British administration of the Ireland and indigenous employers. Over a hundred 'soviets' were proclaimed in the period. This book studies the militancy of working people throughout urban and rural Ireland during these revolutionary years. It examines how this popular militancy impacted on the struggle for independence: how it shaped the policy of the British authorities; how leaders of the national movement, such as de Valera and Collins, were affected by the popular struggle; and how the ebbs and flows of the popular movement were closely intertwined with the issue of partition. This book provides a great deal of detail on working-class militancy between 1917 and 1923.It stresses the large scale and considerable impact of mass action and labor activism, challenging traditional interpretations that focus almost exclusively on the role of armed groups. There is a full account of the strikes, factory occupations and land seizures that shook Irish society. It details popular involvement in the struggles of those years, paying particular attention to the socialist and trade union movement. This revised edition consists of a comprehensive rewrite that updates the work in the light of recent publications and the release of new archive materials. In particular, this new edition includes new eyewitness accounts from the archives of the Bureau of Military History including the testimony of notable trade union activists, an extension of the account of the mutiny of the Connaught Rangers (28 June 1920), and extra information on Michael Collins' intelligence system.

When scholars discuss the medieval past, the temptation is to become immersed there, to deepen our appreciation of the nuances of the medieval sources through debate about their meaning. But the past informs the present in a myriad of ways and medievalists can, and should, use their research to address the concerns and interests of contemporary society. This volume presents a number of carefully commissioned essays that demonstrate the fertility and originality of recent work in Medieval Studies. Above all, they have been selected for relevance. Most contributors are in the earlier stages of their careers and their approaches clearly reflect how interdisciplinary methodologies applied to Medieval Studies have potential repercussions and value far beyond the boundaries of the Middles Ages. These chapters are powerful demonstrations of the value of medieval research to our own times, both in terms of providing answers to some of the specific questions facing humanity today and in terms of much broader considerations. Taken together, the research presented here also provides readers with confidence in the fact that Medieval Studies cannot be neglected without a great loss to the understanding of what it means to be human.