Did you see the headline in the Times, ‘Diet of meat left Crusaders fit for battle’?
Below it there was a short item about research by Gleb Zilberstein, described as an Israeli scientist, which claims that when the Crusaders took on the Muslims, attempting to reclaim Jerusalem in the 12thcentury, they had an advantage because of their diet. This is ‘proved,’ according to the research, by the presence of Crusader food fragments that have been found on ancient pottery.
By this theory, the Crusaders, under Richard the Lionheart, ate mostly lamb, pork and cheese with very few carbs. The Muslim armies, led by Saladin, ate mostly carbs, fruit and veg. According to Zilberstein’s researches, this made the Crusaders slimmer and more ‘cardio’ than the Muslims, which is an explanation for why, according to some accounts, Saladin lost ten soldiers to every one of Richard’s.
This seems rather a grand theory to be based on a few food traces on ancient pottery, though I don’t doubt it pays to be a thin soldier rather than a fat one.
But a little of my own research reveals that in Sahih Bukhari - the collection of sayings and deeds of the Prophet Mohammad (pubh) - the Prophet is reported to have said, ‘The best of the people are those living in my generation, then those who will follow the latter and then those who come after them. Then there will come after them people who will be treacherous and will not be trustworthy, they will bear witness without being asked to do so, and they will vow, but will never fulfil their vows, and fatness will appear among them.’
I’ll just leave that there, while I go off for some pork and cheese.
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