When the present is too hard, turn to the past

My library card is being put to good use these past few months. These days, I am reading a lot about honor killing, which has led me to an interesting discovery: Did you know that the word "assassin" originated in Iran because there was a group called the Order of Assassins?

They can trace them back to 1080 before the first Crusades, and the original name was actually "Hashishin" not "Assassin." Hashishin means "People Who Smoke Hashish." Ha! Apparently, they did their dirty work under the influence of good old THC. They were trained to carry out secret, precise murders of religious or political figures in the name of maintaining free will, and they sometimes worked under contract (their creed: 1. "Stay your blade from the flesh of an innocent." 2. "Hide in plain sight, be one with the crowd." 3. "Never compromise the Brotherhood."). Their leader was referred to as the "Old Man on the Mountain" because their headquarter fortress was located in the Alborz Mountain Range, 60 miles from Tehran. The fortress housed a famous library that scholars and scientists would travel from far away to use. The fortress is very hard to access and one can only be taken to it with a guide who understands mountain travel. Here's the best part though: The name of the fortress was "Alamut", which apparently was the same name they used for the location of the "Sands of Time" in that heinous movie Prince of Persia--lol. Awesome.

I feel like there's an action movie starring Angelina Jolie somewhere in this story... Oh wait, there already is.

The Assassins were destroyed by the Mongol Empire in 1256 after their failed attempt to assassinate Genghis Khan's eldest son. Next on the list: "The Valley of the Assassins" by Freya Stark...