The History of the Assassins - Paperback

by Oswald Charles Wood M. D. (Translator), Joseph Von Hammer (Author)

Assassins ( Hashashin; from Assassiyun: "those faithful to the foundation"), is the name used to refer to the medieval Nizari Ismailis. Often characterized as a secret order led by a mysterious "Old Man of the Mountain", the Nizari Ismailis were an Islamic sect that formed in the late 11th century from a split within Ismailism, itself a branch of Shia Islam. The Nizaris posed a military threat to Sunni Seljuq authority within their territories by capturing and inhabiting many unconnected mountain fortresses throughout Persia (and later also Syria) under the leadership of Hassan-i Sabbah (who is typically regarded as the founder of the Assassins), therefore founding the so-called Nizari Ismaili state with Alamut Castle as its headquarters. Asymmetric warfare, psychological warfare and surgical strikes were often an employed tactic of the hashashin, who would draw their opponents into submission rather than risk killing them. In the modern era, the legend of the assassins continues to motivate insurgencies and terrorist cells throughout Western Asia, which seek to replicate the methods and tactics developed by the Assassins. While "Assassins" typically refers to the entire medieval Nizari sect, in fact only a class of acolytes known as the fida'i actually engaged in assassination work. Lacking their own army, the Nizari relied on these warriors to carry out espionage and assassinations of key enemy figures, and over the course of 300 years successfully killed two caliphs, and many viziers, sultans and Crusader leaders. Under leadership of Imam Rukn-ud-Din Khurshah, the Nizari state declined internally, and was eventually destroyed as the Imam surrendered the castles to the invading Mongols. Sources on the history and thought of the Ismailis in this period are therefore lacking and the majority extant are written by their detractors. Long after their near-eradication, mentions of Assassins were preserved within European sources such as the writings of Marco Polo, where they are depicted as trained killers, responsible for the systematic elimination of opposing figures. Ever since, the word "assassin" has been used to describe a hired or professional killer, paving the way for the related term "assassination", which denotes any action involving murder of a high-profile target for political reasons. The Nizari were feared by the Crusaders, who referred to them collectively as Assassins. The Crusader stories of the Assassins were further embellished by Marco Polo.

Author Biography

Baron Joseph Freiherr von Hammer-Purgstall (9 June 1774 in Graz - 23 November 1856 in Vienna) was an Austrian orientalist. Born Joseph Hammer in Graz, Styria (now Austria), he received his early education mainly in Vienna. Entering the diplomatic service in 1796, he was appointed in 1799 to a position in the Austrian embassy in Constantinople, and in this capacity he took part in the expedition under Admiral William Sidney Smith and General John Hely-Hutchinson against France. In 1807 he returned home from the East, after which he was made a privy councillor. In 1824 he was knighted (Chevalier). For fifty years Hammer-Purgstall wrote prolifically on the most diverse subjects and published numerous texts and translations of Arabic, Persian and Turkish authors. By traversing so large a field, he laid himself open to the criticism of specialists, and he was severely handled by Heinrich Friedrich von Diez (1751-1817), who, in his Unfug und Betrug in der morgenländischen Litteratur, nebst vielen hundert Proben von der groben Unwissenheit des H. v. Hammer zu Wien in Sprachen und Wissenschaften (1815), devoted to him nearly 600 pages of abuse. He also came into friendly conflict on the subject of the origin of The Thousand and One Nights with his younger English contemporary Edward William Lane. Hammer-Purgstall supported the foundation of the Austrian Academy of Sciences in Vienna and became the Academy's first president (1847-1849). The Austrian Oriental Society, founded in 1959 to foster cultural relations with the Near East, is formally named 'Österreichische Orient-Gesellschaft Hammer-Purgstall' in recognition of Joseph von Hammer-Purgstall's accomplishments. He died in Vienna on 23 November 1856