Perfumes in an Historic Town

Something really grabbed me about this array of small bottles containing essential oils and perfume ingredients at an outdoor market, just across the way from the fabulous mosaic museum in Maaret an-Nouman, on the road from Hama to Alep, Syria. The guidebook I was using (Gallimard Footprint) said "Maaret an-Nouman is a dusty little town of little interest, if not for the museum in a caravanserai where splendid mosaics are on display." And they were splendid indeed, I will be happy to post some examples if anyone is interested.
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However, what was of historical interest about Maaret, or Marre as it was known to European Crusaders about 900 years ago, as related in the same guidebook, is of a less charming nature; if your sensibilities are tender, you may want to stop reading here ...... ok, I warned you...
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Translated from the French guidebook : "In 1099 as a large Crusader army was advancing from Antioch across what is today Syria, they were stricken by famine as they laid siege to the town of Marre, where at least 20000 Arabs, or Sarrasins, had taken refuge. The surrounding countryside was not able to furnish enough food for the Crusaders, and many were starving to death during the siege. When they succeeded in entering Marre, they proceeded to massacre the 20000 people within, which apparently was not an uncommon practice at the time. But, as the story goes, due to the starved state they were in, a grislier fate awaited the slaughtered Arabs. A Crusader chief wrote to the Pope, "A terrible famine has struck our army at Marre, we found ourselves in the horrible necessity of nourishing ourselves with Sarrasin flesh." Another crusader, Rodolphe de Caen, wrote in his chronicle of the events, "At Marre our troops had the impious heathens boiled in cauldrons. As for their children, they were skewered and roasted over a fire before being devoured." Albert d'Aix wrote, "Our troops were not only reduced to eating the cadavers of Turcs and Sarrasins, but also their dogs." These events haunted Arab literature for centuries afterwards. It is not surprising that even today, as evidenced by much of the anti-American rhetoric circulating in the Arab world concerning events in Iraq, that Arab people may have a visceral hatred or repugnance to anything resembling a crusade."
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