Saladin? bad idea

[nonoyesnonono]

I just read in the the german site civilized.de that Saladin would be an arab leader... But (I just checked in on Wikipedia) he was kurdish! And even if he sure had a lot to with arab history - that's not quite the same! I think we hear enough about it every day in the news... So, please, folks at Firaxis, don't do that! It's not only historically wrong, it's really a bad idea.

[Anaximander]

Kurdish or not, was he not the leader of the muslims that drove the Christians out of Jersulam after the first Crusade and then fought Richard the Lionheart to a standstill? If my history is correct then why would he not make a good leader for the Arabs?

[ChrisiusMaximus]

have to disagree he was a truly great leader of Islam and therefore a great leader of the Arabs

[Imran Siddiqui]

He was the leader of the Arabic peoples during the Crusades, so I think he's alright. After all the English encompases people from the Angles, Saxons and Jutes.

[sophist]

Arab and Islam are not the same thing. I think most Muslims in the world are now not ethnically Arab. The nation with the most Muslims is Indonesia; I think India is second. That would be like saying Constantine was a great leader of the Jews because Christianity came from Judaism.

[Solver]

Alexander wasn't even Greek, yet he has always been the Greek leader .

[sophist]

Hmm... That's a good point. I wonder how distant the Macedonians were from the Greeks vs. how distant the Kurds are from Arabs.

[Ninot]

I hope Saladin looks like a bad ass.

Can't have all the leaders looking cute.

[Solver]

Both are pairs of different nationalities. It's similar really.

Alexander is a Macedonian who led the Greeks, and Macedonians were close to Greeks, but differnet.
Saladin is a Kurd who led the Arabs, and the Kurds were close to Arabs, but also different.

OTOH, Macedon was a Greek state, I don't know if Kurds lived in states of arab countries or not.

[DerSchwarzfalke]

Good old Salah ad-Din was a Kurd who led an Arab empire. That makes him a leader of the Arabs, if not an Arab leader.

[1889]

Hitler wasn't german, Schwarzenegger isn't american and McCain isn't a republican. I say leave Saladin in.

[ChrisiusMaximus]

McCain didnt he invent oven chips ?

[Nikolai]

Originally posted by Ninot
I hope Saladin looks like a bad ass.

Can't have all the leaders looking cute.

I think I saw a pic of him the other day, I'll check if I can find it again.

[Nikolai]

Here, this seems to be him.

[joncnunn]

Macedonia was not a Greek State. The Macedonians were nearby barbarians who overran the various city states of Greece and then over time adopted the Greek culture. Following the conquest of Greece, the Macedonians were admired by the Greeks, especally the Spartans, for their military strength.

The Kurdish homeland is much further away from Arabia than the Macedonians were to Greece. Both the Arabs and Kurds originated as barbarbians, the Arabs from Saudi Arabia, and the Kurds had settled in what's now Eastern Turkey / Northern Iraq / North western Iran after having fled the Mongolian tribes in Central Asia. It's no particular suprize that the leader of the muslium army defending Jersuleum from King Richard and the 3rd Crusade was a Kurd. By then, there was more non-arabs in the Muslium army than arabs. In fact the Kurds were probably the best fighters at the time in the muslium empire; the Turks hadn't yet arrived in the Middle East.

Originally posted by Solver
Both are pairs of different nationalities. It's similar really.

Alexander is a Macedonian who led the Greeks, and Macedonians were close to Greeks, but differnet.
Saladin is a Kurd who led the Arabs, and the Kurds were close to Arabs, but also different.

OTOH, Macedon was a Greek state, I don't know if Kurds lived in states of arab countries or not.