The Eighth Crusade

King Louis of France wasn’t ready to give up. In 270, he negotiated with those scary hordes, the Mongols, mentioned in the Sixth Crusade. He figured Christians and the Mongols could combine forces and finally drive the Muslim people out of the Holy Land. He knew that in them he had a great weapon.

But the Muslims had a great weapon, too. There was a practice at the time of abducting young Russian slaves, forcing them to convert to Islam, bringing them into the Muslim world and training them to become extremely cruel warriors who would protect the most important leaders. These slave children were raised without any mercy, so they knew none. They were called Mamelukes and they were some of the meanest people in all of history. At one point, an Arab Muslim leader had tried to get rid of his protective Mameluke warriors and they got rid of him instead. That’s how Qutuz, the Mameluke Muslim, came to power. Qutuz and his army easily decimated the feared Mongols. Now that’s just scary.

King Louis was on his own now. His Mongol surprise wasn’t going to work. On top of that, he found only 10,000 people willing to march in the Eighth Crusade. When the crusaders’ ships landed in Africa, King Louis died of a stomach problem and the final crusade collapsed. He was later canonized as Saint Louis. In the meantime, the Mamelukes killed off all Christian knights and people anywhere in the Holy Land. It was over. The Arab nations ruled the land that had been fought over for so long. The year was 1291.