Note 122 — BOOK III.

The discovery of this lance and the prodigies that it operated are related by all the historians of the Crusades. The Arabian historian Aboul-Mabaçen agrees, in the principal circumstances, with the Latin historians. The most credulous of the latter, and he who gives the greatest number of details, is Raymond d’Agiles. Albert d’Aix, William of Tyre, Guibert, and Robert, raise not the least doubt about the authenticity of the lance. Foucher de Chartres, less credulous, says, when relating the discovery, Audi fraudem et non fraudem. He afterward adds, whilst speaking of the lance, that it had been concealed in the place from which it was taken: Invenit lanceam, falliciter occultatam forsitan. The historian Paulus Emilius, who relates the same fact accompanies it with highly philosophical reflections. Yves Duchat says, on commencing the relation “Then there happened a marvellous affair, of which some have left a written account, which I would not affirm to be entirely true, nor would I oppugn it as false.” Anna Comnena says nothing about the lance, but speaks of the nails which had been used to nail Christ to the cross. Albufaradge commits the same error. In general the accounts of both the Greeks and the Arabians of this war must be read with much precaution; they furnish us with very few positive ideas.