Sir Oliver Cademus

“Do not think to lecture me with antiquated notions of good and evil. You have all gorged upon the darkness within your hearts and now, cloaked in your own hypocrisy, you come before me parading yourselves as pillars of virtue. Be careful heroes, perhaps one day you will find yourselves standing where I am, facing men such as yourselves who seek your destruction.”

Background

Who was Oliver Cademus and What was his connection to the Book of Cademus?

Details are sketchy about the founder of the Book of Cademus. Born 1072 in England to Mary and Sir John Cademus, Oliver was the last of six children, he was also the only son. Soon after his birth, around 1075, the family moved to France where Oliver’s ailing grandfather had left his estate to his daughter Mary.

Born into wealth and prosperity Oliver’s childhood was happy and carefree, as the son of a knight he soon became immersed in the dream of one-day becoming a knight like his father. After many years Oliver was to receive his wish and was dubbed knight aged 21 in the year of our lord 1096. In that same year Oliver was to face his first and last trial as a knight….The first crusade.

The Crusades inspired not only the most dedicated valour but also bloodthirsty cruelty, and the greediest vandalism of medieval men.

As a result of the meeting Pope Urban II had with leaders among the French nobility at Clermont and where he delivered a rousing call to arms. Oliver and his father, now quite advanced in years but having no intention of missing out on one last chance for glory, decided to join the holy crusade to put down the infidels who threatened their brethren and the holy places of Christendom

It is here where details about Oliver and his father’s involvement with the most bloodthirsty and cruellest of the five crusades which took place over several years become sketchy. It is however thought from records unearthed from letters sent home by Oliver to his mother that both he and his father were at hand when the army entered the holy city of Jerusalem on July 15, 1099. A bloodbath ensued with the Crusaders cutting down all before them. HIs father was killed during the attack.

Seeing bloody aftermath of the battle, his dreams of chivalry and honour forever tainted, the young Oliver was said to have cast off his armour and taken the robes of one of the dead and ridden away. Nothing was heard from him until his return eight years later to England where his mother and the remainder of his family had now returned.

Oliver was a changed man, bursting with new-found knowledge and a renewed sense of purpose. Soon after his return he was hailed as great prophet and holy man by the local townspeople, as they could not understand how else he could have survived on his own in a world of heathens and savages.