Charlemagne, meaning Charles the Great, was King of the Franks from 768 and Emperor of the Romans (Imperator Romanorum) from 800 to his death in 814. He expanded the Frankish kingdom into an empire that incorporated much of Western and Cent...

Offa (son of Thingfrith, son of Eanulf), King of Mercia, was one of the leading figures of Saxon history. He obtained the throne of Mercia in 757, after the murder of his cousin, King Aethelbald, by Beornraed. After spending fourteen years...

Roland, the great French hero of the medieval Charlemagne cycle of chansons de geste, immortalized in the Chanson de Roland (11th or 12th cent.). Existence of an early Roland poem is indicated by the historian Wace's statement that Taillefe...

Rurik or Riurik was a legendary Varangian chieftain who gained control of Ladoga in 862, built the Holmgard settlement near Novgorod, and founded the Rurik Dynasty, which ruled Kievan Rus (and later the Grand Duchy of Moscow and Tsardom of...

Tancred of Hauteville was an eleventh-century Norman petty lord about whom little is known. His historical importance comes entirely from the accomplishments of his sons and later descendants. He was a minor noble near Coutances in the Cote...

Alp Arslan was the second Sultan of the Seljuq Empire and great-grandson of Seljuq, the eponymous founder of the dynasty. His real name was Muhammad bin Dawud Chaghri, and for his military prowess, personal valour, and fighting skills he ob...

Roger I (Roger Guiscard), c.1031-1101, Norman conqueror of Sicily; son of Tancred de Hauteville. He went to Italy in 1058 to join his brother, Robert Guiscard, in conquering Apulia and Calabria from the Byzantines. Between 1061 and 1091 he...

Alfonso VI, nicknamed the Brave (El Bravo) or the Valiant, was King of León from 1065, king of King of Castile and de facto King of Galicia from 1072, and self-proclaimed "Emperor of all Spain". Much romance has gathered around his name. Al...

Rodrigo (or Ruy) Díaz de Vivar, nicknamed El Cid Campeador, was a Castilian military and political leader in medieval Spain. Born of the minor nobility, El Cid was educated in the royal Castilian court and became an important general and ad...

Bohemond I, Prince of Taranto and Prince of Antioch, was one of the leaders of the First Crusade. The Crusade had no outright military leader, but instead was ruled by a committee of nobles. Bohemond was one of the most important of these l...

Baldwin I of Jerusalem, was one of the leaders of the First Crusade, who became the first Count of Edessa and then the second ruler and first titled King of Jerusalem. He was the brother of Godfrey of Bouillon, who was the first ruler of th...

Godfrey of Bouillon was a leader of the First Crusade. He was either the eldest or the second son of Eustace II, Count of Boulogne, and Ida, daughter of Godfrey III, Duke of Lower Lorraine. He was designated by his uncle, Godfrey the Hunchb...

Hugues de Payens, also de Payns, a French knight from the Champagne region, was the co-founder and first Grand Master of the Knights Templar. With Saint Bernard of Clairvaux, he created the Latin Rule, the code of behavior for the Order....

Alfonso I, called the Battler or the Warrior (Spanish: el Batallador), was the king of Aragon and Navarre from 1104 until his death in 1134. He was the second son of King Sancho Ramírez and successor of his brother Peter I. With his marriag...

Afonso I of Portugal (English Alphonzo), more commonly known as Afonso Henriques, was the first King of Portugal, declaring his independence from León. Afonso was the son of Henry of Burgundy, Count of Portugal and Teresa of León, the illeg...