Assassin's Creed... Fact or Fiction?

[PrettyBasic]

After playing through Assassin's creed for the second time, I was curious as to whether some of these Characters did indeed exist. (Well I know Richard the Lionhearted and Saladin, although never portrayed.) Was there really a league of Assassins, or, as M2TW calls them, Hashashim?

I thought it was appropiate to use this website as means of finding out, since after all, Many TW fans are also History buffs.

[Watchman]

Well, I wouldn't call it a league...

[PrettyBasic]

Haha, they were called so because they consumed Hashish! Well i guess the article validated the Orders existence somewhat, but were there still people like Montferrat, Talal, etc?

I can't wait for the sequel!

[Watchman]

I suggest reading the "Etymology" part of the article.

Anyway, regarding the charas, the heck would I know, never played the game. The Syrian Assassins' relations with their Christian neighbours were pretty interesting though, as they basically paid rent to the Templars (who owned all the castles around their main base) and in return were basically left to their own damn devices. They're known to have once tried threatening the warrior-monks with assasinating their Grand Master - the Templars were quite nonplussed and pointed out they would simply have elected the next one, and recognising the impotence of their main weapon in the situation the Assassins backed down and compromised.

Also, their religious doctrines apparently eventually went just plain weird (in a "trippy transcendent" fashion) and *very* unorthodox - in a somewhat ill-advised move one of their leaders went public with this, which did nothing to improve their already poor standing in the eyes of other Muslims.

[PrettyBasic]

Do you know of the Knight's Relations towards the Crusaders? Was there alot of Corruption and Rivalry, as portrayed in the game? It would explain alot of the Charactars Motives. Did the Grandmaster govern a city himself or did he delegate that to his suboordinates? What where the Grandmaster's duties? I hope you can explain to me.

Their "home base" was Masyaf, right smack dab in the middle of Jerusalem, Acre and Damascus. Wouldn't the Crusaders just have driven them out of the holy land? Like they did to all the other muslim groups? I wonder if they were ever actually used in standard militaries like M2TW portrays. I guess it may just have to go in to the Roman Ninja/Flaming War Pig bin from Rome: Total War.

[Watchman]

Knights Templar. The various Military Orders are a whole complex topic by themselves, but in the context of the Crusader States of the Outremer to a large degree formed the bulwark that kept the embattled realms afloat - and not in the least by their adminstrative competence, which enabled them to make very effective use of the income they derived from their various domains and holdings and deploy far more mercenaries and brother-knights and -sergeants to the front than the meager resources of the Crusader States themselves allowed.

Their specific relations with the various other powers of the Levant rather varied over time and according to the specific personalities involved, as well as the usual changing fortunes and circumstances, but AFAIK those with the resident Christian elites were normally friendly if not always exactly cordial (the latter being only too well aware of how vital the Orders were to their realms' continued survival). Relations with Crusaders from Europe could get *quite* turbulent, however - the Templars and one Holy Roman Emperor once very nearly came to blows over some dispute...

[Entropy Judge]

were there still people like Montferrat, Talal, etc?

Likewise with Watchman, I've not played the game, so I don't know who-all is in it, but:
Montferrat is a region in Italy - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rulers_of_Montferrat

And Talal seems to be a really common name in the Middle East.

My guess is that any major characters with a background that is actually verifiable did exist.

[ThiudareiksGunthigg]

After playing through Assassin's creed for the second time, I was curious as to whether some of these Characters did indeed exist. (Well I know Richard the Lionhearted and Saladin, although never portrayed.) Was there really a league of Assassins, or, as M2TW calls them, Hashashim?

I thought it was appropiate to use this website as means of finding out, since after all, Many TW fans are also History buffs.

The game is basically a fantasy scenario which takes some bits and pieces of real history (the Assassins, Templars, Hospitallers etc) and uses them in a story which bears virtually no relation to history.

It's a rather nifty looking gaming experience, but the gameplay got a bit repetitive after a while - talk to a contact, leap around rooftops avoiding guards, fight some guards you couldn't avoid, climb a tower, tick tower off your list, run across rooftops, repeat for days on end.

If you want to find out what the Templars, Assassins etc were really all about, I'd suggest a good basic introduction of the history of the Crusades. Thomas Madden's The New Concise History of the Crusades would be a good place to start.

[Sher Khan]

Al Mualim - A title rather than name, which means 'the teacher.' Though not named, most likely inspired by the Old Man of the Mountain, Rashid ad-Din Sinan, who was appointed leader of the Assassins in norther Syria governed from - you guessed it - Masyaf.
Robert de Sable - Grandmaster of the Templars in-game, Grandmaster of the Templars in reality.
Garnier de Nablus - Hospitaller Grandmaster in game and in reality. Doubtful he spent his days breaking legs and getting patients high on funky weeds, however.
William de Montferrat - William V, Marquess of Montferrat or William the Old. Though I believe he stayed in Tyre for the most part, rather than sit in Acre and take lip from Richard.
Sibrand - Meister Sibrand, first Grandmaster of the early order of the Teutonic Knights.

All of these people in Assassin's Creed are high profile enough to be known to have existed in history (of course, without the poetic licences the game takes with them).

Tamir the merchant, however, is too generic a name to have been known, though it's not like Damascus wasn't filled with rich merchants with possibly one being named a common name like Tamir. But obviously no Damascene merchant would be able to get away with murder in broad daylight in a busy souk like Tamir did.

The same applies for Talal.

I've never heard of an Abu'l Nuqoud in Damascus, though he, like the others, sounds like he was given a generic name, a generic title (the father of money, lol). But I don't doubt Damascus was home to a few roly-poly rich men looking down on the poor. Majd ad-Din, another generic title common of most high-born Muslims of the time to prefer, is also an unknown though there was a Majd ad-Din that Saladin wrangled with, but he was a rambunctious governor in Yemen I believe. He could also be based on Baha ad-Din, they seem similar enough. But a governor of Damascus? Baha ad-Din never got that spot, but then again, neither did Majd ad-Din (who apparently tricked all of Damascus into making them think Saladin really did appoint him).

Jubair al Hakeem seems to have also gotten a title (Hakeem meaning the 'wise,' referring obviously to his mission to burn all books in his quest to find the truth), rather than have been based on any particular person (though Damascus, Ibn Jubayr (!possibly inspiration as a historical scholar!) records, was a Mecca (hah!) for scholars in the Muslim world at the time).

[Dust be in Thy Mouth, Infidel!]

I've read the Angels & Demons book. I know it's not 100% accurate, but a Hassassin is thinking of how his forefathers used to take out Crusaders in the Holy Land, and how the word assassin evolved from them.

[Watchman]

Dude. Dan Brown. He's a meme.