ClearlyInvisible

I ment Hattin was a distraciton to help a siege.

The battle of Hattin was to distract Templar forces from Jerusalem onto a better playing field for the Turk/Arab Coalition. It opened the road to Jerusalem, so I often see it as part of the whole "Battle of Jerusalem". Sorry for the confusion.

harbinger

Better soldier richard,better leader saladin.

Minksterella

on the battlefield he never lost besides arsuf

Vintersorg

godfried van bouillon because he's technically my countryman!

DreamWeaver

Montgisard 1177

DreamWeaver

Not really.

The Battle of Hattin occurred because the army of the Kingdom of Jerusalem (20,000 approx, containing Templars, Hospitallers and feudal host) was on its way to relieve Saladin's siege of Tiberias. The battle was a necessary event lest it be a repeat (for either side) of the stalemate situation that had occurred in 1183. If anything the siege was there to induce Hattin, not the other way around. The way to open to Jerusalem, was either capturing the castles of Shawbak and Kerak, without whom the city could not be defended from approach, or destroying the crusaders potential garrison, which effectively happened at Hattin.

Minksterella

My apologies, i was mistakenly informed.

acdc1272

I agree, but just out of interest, do you have any other reason?

Vintersorg

Well, because he went from being a relatively unimportant noble in his homeland to being the king of Jerusalem. That's a rather impressive career.

Also, I do not know enough about Saladin yet to give my opinion about him (give me some time to finish the book about the Crusades I'm reading )
And Richard the Lionheart, well, I can't have the slightest bit of respect to a guy who orders the execution of 2700 prisoners of war. Especially not considering the prisoners were entrusted to someone else, until he decided he should be the one holding them, before realising he couldn't bother with having them all in tow.

Greenblood07

Saladin .... Better commander , better leader of his people , better strategist and most of all .... a better achiever in the history!

Richard was probably a better one-to-one solider than Saladin but as a general , Saladin was way ahead. Richard actually wasn't a very good leader. Though he inspired his soldiers with bravery , he remained indecisive on Jerusalem. He went in to attack but came back...again..he went in to attack..reached the wall of Jerusalem and yet again came back out of hesitation....

Richard and Saladin never went "all-out" on eachother but if they had done so...there's no doubt that Saladin would've been the ultimate winner (With couple of victories in Richard's bag too)