Meet Saladin: Honor in Victory

1187

Eighty-eight years after Crusaders took Jerusalem in a massacre, Saladin took it back — and forbade one. Ransoms were set, then quietly waived by the thousands; his brother asked for a thousand poor captives to free as a gift. Richard the Lionheart fell sick besieging him; Saladin sent fruit and snow.

Dying poor

The sultan of Egypt and Syria died with, by tradition, one gold piece and forty-seven silver — he had given the rest away. His deathbed counsel to his son was the quote above: blood never sleeps. Magnanimity was not a luxury of his power; it was the source of it.

Why they belong at your table

Seat him when you hold the upper hand and the question is what kind of victor to be. His answer made even his enemies keep his name.