Arguably, the only fruit of the Crusades kept by the Christians was the apricot. - Norman Davies

All the nations that ever lived have left their footsteps in the sand. The traces fade with every tide, the echoes grow faint, the images are fractured, the human material is atomized and recycled. But if we know where to look, there is always a remnant, a remainder, an irreducible residue.

The debased coinage of his reign bore his initials, ICR: Iohannes Casimirus Rex. These were taken to stand for Initium Calamitatum Reipublicae, the Beginning of the Republic's Catastrophes.

They wanted peace and they fought for thirty years to be sure of it. They did not learn then, and have not learned since, that war only breeds war.