A Wannabe "Crusader" in the Trump Cabinet
A troubling medievalism that calls for holy war against fellow Americans
Modern Medieval
by David M. Perry and Matthew Gabriele
First of all, sorry for the radio silence lately! The 2 of us have been quite busy preparing for the release of our new book, Oathbreakers, which will be out December 10 (but January 16 in the UK and Europe). Plus, also, there was this big election thing in the United States earlier this month…
Related to that, incoming President Trump, has recently suggested that he’ll nominate the Fox News pundit Pete Hegseth as his Secretary of Defense. This shocked us (along with many others), not just because he’s very unqualified for a job of this magnitude, but also for a very “medieval” reason: his tattoos.
What’s pictured here is just one of many, but the other tell the same story. As other scholars of the American right have noted in the wake of this announcement, the phrase “Deus Vult” (Latin for “God wills it”) has a long and dangerous history. According to contemporary medieval sources, it’s supposedly the phrase shouted by soldiers in responding to the call of the First Crusade in 1095 CE. But in the modern world (particularly the US), it’s long been associated with Islamophobic violence.
For example, “deus vult” appeared as a rallying cry (along with one of Hegseth’s other tattoos, of the Jerusalem Cross) at the white supremacist rally at Charlottesville, and then again at the Insurrection at the Capitol on January 6, 2021. Indeed, as we’ve written about elsewhere, this type of “crusader” imagery has been popular in the Trumpist camp for many years.
Trump’s first administration was no stranger to Christian nationalism but, as Jeff Sharlet has pointed out, Hegseth’s elevation is an escalation - a statement that the medieval is being invited into the modern world, and holy war against non-christians and leftists (however vaguely defined) is on the horizon.
Thanks for reading Modern Medieval! Subscribe for free to receive new posts every week.
Thanks for explaining the tattoos - and, yes, we who are being "crusaded against" have many reasons to be scared.