Norman Sicily #1) The Normans in the South, 1016-1130 (1967. 1992)

(anonymous comment: Cleaned up the formatting a bit) In 1016, a rebel Lombard lord appealed to a group of pilgrims for help-and unwittingly set in motion "the other Norman Conquest." The Normans in the South is the epic story of the House of of Robert Guiscard, perhaps the most extraordinary European adventurer between Caesar and Napoleon; his brother Roger, who helped him win Sicily from the Saracens; and his nephew Roger II, crowned at Palermo in 1130. The Kingdom in the Sun vividly evokes this "sad, superb, half-forgotten kingdom, cultivated, cosmopolitan, and tolerant," which lasted a mere 64 years. It concludes with the poignant defeat of the bastard King Tancred in 1194, bringing to a close this extraordinary chapter in Italian history. With a comprehensive listing of all of Sicily's surviving Norman monuments, the result is a superb traveler's companion and a masterpiece of the historian's art. and of Roger's descendants, notably his son Roger II, who converted his father's achievement into a cosmopolitan and cultivated kingdom whose surviving monuments still dazzle us today. The Normans in the South is the first of two volumes that recount the dazzling story of the Norman Kingdom of Sicily. This omnibus volume is made up of John Julius Norwich's first two works of history - "The Normans in the South" and "The Kingdom in the Sun". The books tell the story of the dazzling Norman kingdom of Sicily founded in the 11th century by an enterprising band of adventurers from Normandy. To the traveller, heading eastwards from Foggia to the sea, the gaunt grey shadow of Monte Gargano looms over the plain like a thundercloud. The Normans in the South, 1016-1130 The kingdom in the sun, 1130-1194.