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The word crouchback might conjure an image of some kind of deformity, and indeed for many years scholars believed King Edward’s brother, Edmund, to have been hunchbacked because he was referred to by contemporary chroniclers as Edmund Crouchback.
Rather than being a reference to Prince Edmund’s physical appearance, however, crouchback was actually an accolade and referred to his participation in the Ninth Crusade. During the medieval period, by going on crusade, a man was not only cleansed of his sins for a lifetime but from then on was accorded the honor of being allowed to have a cross embroidered onto the back of his clothing. The word crouchback derives from the French word for cross, croix, which became ‘crouch’ in English. Thus, crouchback is another word for crusader—and the title of this book.
