Description

In the full ferment of the twelfth century, the Kingdom of Jerusalem found in Baldwin IV a singular ruler: a king marked by leprosy who turned pain into discipline, fragility into method, and faith into state policy. This book traces his childhood and education, his ascension amidst intrigue, his campaigns against Saladin, the construction of a sober administrative machinery, the complex diplomacy with military orders and neighboring powers, and the twilight of power amid regencies and succession disputes. With informative and humanized prose, the work illuminates how a monarch could sustain a small kingdom in the face of a greater storm, and how his legacy—made of prudence, justice, and logistics—continued to resonate until the Horns of Hattin and beyond. Myth, chronicle, and fiction dialogue to offer a complete portrait of a king who taught how to govern from the limit.