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We are pleased to faithfully reproduce on our web site the latest of the cultural initiatives undertaken by Massolini Group: the 1999 Calendar. An initiative which knows its origin to the late John Baptist Massolini with Calendars dedicated to Jordan (1989), Lebanon (1992), Syria (1993), Sinai (1994) Madaba Mosaic Map (1996) and Egypt (1998). The Holy Land of the Crusaders wants to commemorate the ninth centenary of the First Crusade, an event which has greatly marked the second christian millenium and the relations between the west and the moslem world. Notwithstading the different evaluations presented by modern scholars of this complex movement of the Crusades, the reconstructed churches or that which remains from this artistic heritage with which the crusader architects and artists had filled towns, villages and countryside are witness to the medieval love of western christianity towards the Holy Sites. A period which brought deaths and sufferings on both sides and which lasted till 1291. Subsequently a new and different presence established itself at the Holy Sites followig in the footsteps of St. Francis: the Franciscans whose presence was officially recognised by the Catholic Church by the setting up of the Franciscan Custody of the Holy Land in 1342.

NB.
All small images in the following pages are thumbnails
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• Itinera Hierosolymitana Crucisignatorum - 1095-1291
  (The Crusaders' Journeys to Jerusalem)

• Corpus Inscriptionum Crucesignatorum Terrae Sanctae - 1099-1291
  (Anthology of Crusader Inscriptions in the Holy Land)

• The Peaceful Liberation of the Holy Places in the XIV Century