FACSIMILE EDITION of a treatise by a Venetian statesman and geographer Marino Sanuto or Sanudo the Elder of Torcello (1260-1338) (Marinus Sanutus Torcellus), best known for his lifelong attempts to revive the crusading spirit and movement; with this object he wrote this great work - the Secreta (or Liber Secretorum) Fidelium Crucis, otherwise called Historia Hierosolymitana, Liber de expeditione Terrae Sanctae, and Opus Terrae Sanctae, the last being perhaps the proper title of the whole treatise as completed in three parts or "books". This work has much to say of trade and trade-routes as well as of political and other history; and through its accompanying maps and plans it occupies an important place in the development of cartography. Begun in March 1306 and finished (in its earliest form) in January 1307, it was offered to Pope Clement V as a manual for true Crusaders who desired the reconquest of the Holy Land,; to this original Liber Secretorum Sanuto added largely; two other "books" were composed between December 1312 and September 1321, when the entire work was presented by the author to Pope John XXII, together with a map of the world, a map of Palestine, a chart of the Mediterranean, Black Sea and west European coasts, and plans of Jerusalem, Antioch and Acre. A copy was also offered to the king of France, to whom Sanuto desired to commit the military and political leadership of the new crusade. Contains foreword by the Israeli historian, an eminent authority on the Crusades and Kingdom of Jerusalem - Joshua Prawer (1917-1990). Includes color maps. 300x230mm. XIX+[X]+312 pages. Brown fake leather Hardcover with gilt front cover and spine. Cover bottom edge bumped. Cover corners, spine edges and hinges rubbed. Contents page wrinkled. Else in good condition.