Kingdom of Hevean was well made and closer to reality than 300.
Whats so funny about 300 is that they were protraying Persia as an evil empire and Sparta
a free society, when infact it was the opposite. Sparta was utterly evil 70% of the popualtion practically slaves, they were like souther slave owners on crack.
It also highly exagerates the importance of Thermophylea, it was Athens that saved all of greece when they won the naval battle of Salamis, and the land battle of Marathon.
It was Athens that started the war by provoking the Persians, it was Athens that created alliances, it was athens that lost everything, including occupation by the persian but they still fought on.
[quote]While reports from the era talk about armies in the hundreds of thousands, in fact the numbers were likely MUCH smaller, as logistically it would have been very difficult to sustain an army in the hundreds of thousands logistically. Water was scarce, food had to be transported over long distances in harsh and unforgiving terrain. Number counting was poor, exagerating enemy strengths common. I would be surprised if Salahudin fielded an Army in excess of 25,000 during the campaign against Balian.
Hollywood loves dramatic effect and it loves hyperbole.
I kind of liked the movie "Kingdom of Heaven". BUT, the catapults of the era had a maximum range of 150 meters - and that's max. They were generally used to hurl stones against fortress walls and eventually bring them down through repeated striking. This was a laborious process that often took weeks, but in the case of Jerusalum was about 5 days. There was no evidence of nor reports of flaming balls being hurled over the walls, and if that did happen, the flaming balls certainly did not come from over the horizon or behind a hill or ridge.
While reports from the era talk about armies in the hundreds of thousands, in fact the numbers were likely MUCH smaller, as logistically it would have been very difficult to sustain an army in the hundreds of thousands logistically. Water was scarce, food had to be transported over long distances in harsh and unforgiving terrain. Number counting was poor, exagerating enemy strengths common. I would be surprised if Salahudin fielded an Army in excess of 25,000 during the campaign against Balian.[/quote]
MAC the Crusaders are important to both of us becuase of the religous signifigance of Jerusalem, but the entire wars of the crusades were a mere sideshow.
You were right Slahudeen never had more than 20,000-30,000 the Crusaders never reached anymore than 10 to 15 thousend max.
The real wars happened in the east, with the Giant State of Khorezm forming, with the Islamic Indian Sultanates and China.
The Battle of the Indus which was fought between the entire mongol army of 150,000 against an equal number of Khorazmian troops is one example, The Kara Khitai and the Southern Sung could field armies of Simliar size.
