Steven Runciman Quotes

Sir James Cochran Stevenson Runciman , known as Steven Runciman, was an English historian best known for his three-volume A History of the Crusades .

His three-volume history has had a profound impact on common conceptions of the Crusades, primarily portraying the Crusaders negatively and the Muslims favourably. Runciman was a strong admirer of the Byzantine Empire, and consequently held a bias against the Crusaders for the Fourth Crusade evident in his work. While praised by older crusade historians as a storyteller and prose stylist, he is viewed as biased by some contemporary historians. Wikipedia

✵ 7. July 1903 – 1. November 2000

Famous Steven Runciman Quotes

“Unlike Christianity, which preached a peace that it never achieved, Islam unashamedly came with a sword.”

Steven Runciman book A History of the Crusades

A History of the Crusades (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, [1951-54] 1957) vol. 1 p. 15.

“Riches should come as the reward for hard work, preferably one's forebears.”

Steven Runciman

A Traveller's Alphabet (London: Thames and Hudson, 1991); quoted in The Times Literary Supplement, February 2, 2001.

“I believe that the supreme duty of the historian is to write history, that is to say, to attempt to record in one sweeping sequence the greater events and movements that have swayed the destinies of man.”

Steven Runciman book A History of the Crusades

A History of the Crusades (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, [1951-54] 1957) vol. 3 p. xiii.Steven Runciman delivered a lecture in the University of the Punjab Lahore (Pakistan) on Monday, Feb 24, 1964 at 11.00 A. M in the University of Senate Hall. The topic was " Personal Contacts between Muslims and Christians in the Middle Ages". Professor Hamid Ahmad Khan VC presided the lecture. Allama Muhammad Yousuf Gabriel attended this lecture and gave a letter to Sir S.Runciman to deliever it to Sir Bertrand Russel. Sir Steven delievered t his letter to Bertrand Russel and he sent a reply to Allama Muhammad Yousuf Gabriel but address was not Pakistan but India. The letter was returned from India to Pakistan and was handed over to Yousuf Gabriel. Sir Bertrand Russel wrote : " Since Adam and Eve ate the apple man has never abstained any folly what ever he could do and the end is atomic hell".