6. The Old Man of the Mountain
Sheik Hassan al Sabah (1034 – 1124) was a charismatic but shady Islamic scholar who founded the Assassins cult, which terrorized the Middle East for a century and a half. He started in 1090 by seizing Alamout Castle in the mountains south of the Caspian Sea. His followers expanded from there to establish a series of remote mountain fortresses in the highlands of Persia and Syria, earning Sabah the nickname Old Man of the Mountain.
He reportedly had so much charm that he convinced recruits that he held the keys to paradise, aided by innovative brainwashing techniques. Prospects would be summoned to an Assassin fortress, housed in bare cells, and subjected to daily religious lectures, during which it would gradually be hinted that the Sheik held the keys to paradise. Then, a promising recruit would be drugged with hashish, earning the group the Arabic name “Hashashin” – eventually rendered into “Assassins” by Europeans.
The recruit came to, high on hash, amidst beautifully landscaped gardens, with gurgling streams meandering between trees ripe with fruit, and vines heavy with grapes. Tame deer and lambs frolicked about; peacocks wandered around, ruffling and spreading their plumes; and birds of paradise flitted above, filling the air with their song. The stunning surroundings were complemented by stunningly beautiful women to seduce the recruit and satisfy all his desires.
Plying the youth with wine and hash, and feeding him mouth watering delicacies, the temptresses would convince the besotted recruit that he was in paradise, and that his seductresses were the houris promised those who made it into heaven. Then, after days of delights and heavenly pleasures, the youth would be drugged senseless again, and removed from the gardens.
He would awake back in his bare cell, and informed that he had been in paradise, sent there by the grace of Sheik Sabah, who held the keys to heaven. The recruit would then be told that he could return to paradise, provided he died while killing the Sheik’s enemies. It was highly effective: suicide squads of horny fanatics, high on hash and desperate to die while killing the cult’s enemies, descended from the Assassins’ mountain holdfasts to terrorize the Middle East.
An early believer in “propaganda of the deed”, Sabah had his Assassins murder their victims in as dramatic and public a manner, to advertise his cult’s reach. It also struck fear into the hearts of leading men by fostering the perception that those targeted by the Assassins were dead men walking, no matter the precautions taken. Sabah’s cult survived him for nearly two centuries, until they were done in by the Mongols.