Medieval poets depicted enemy wealth as fabulous and irresistible for plunder.

Evidence

The fabulous wealth of the Jewish temple, covered “with rebies grete, / With perles and peritotes,” glowing with gold and having “dores ful of dyemauntes” (1250–53) is pillaged by the Roman armies, just as the fabulous wealth of the mosques is taken by the crusaders. The treasures of Jerusalem, the poet relates, are too abundant to be described: “Telle couthe no tonge ; the tresours that thei ther founden, / Jewels for joly men, ; jemewes riche, / Ffloreyns of fyne gold ; no freke wanted, / Riche pelour and pane,; princes to wer, / Besantes, bies of gold, ; broches and rynges, / Clene clothes of selke ; many carte-fulle” [No tongue could tell all the treasures they found there: jewels for jolly men, and rich gems. No man lacked florins of fine gold, rich furs and cloth suited to princes, besants, gold bracelets, brooches and rings, clothes of pure silk—many cartfuls of them] (1270–75). — Ivan Davidson Kalmar, Derek Penslar, Orientalism and the Jews, 247