Battle of Halmyros

Coordinates: 39°10.8′N 22°45.6′E / 39.1800°N 22.7600°E / 39.1800; 22.7600
Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Battle of Halmyros
Boeotic Cephissus, near Orchomenos)
39°10.8′N 22°45.6′E / 39.1800°N 22.7600°E / 39.1800; 22.7600
Result Catalan victory and conquest of the Duchy of Athens
Belligerents Catalan Company Duchy of Athens
and alliesCommanders and leaders Unknown
Walter V 
Strength 2,000 cavalry
4,000 infantry
(
Chronicle of the Morea)
3,500 cavalry
4,000 infantry
(Gregoras) 700 knights
24,000 infantry
(Muntaner)
6,400 cavalry
8,000 infantry
(Gregoras)
2,000 cavalry
4,000 infantry
(Chronicle of the Morea)Casualties and losses Unknown Very heavy
Battle of Halmyros is located in Greece
Battle of Halmyros
Location within Greece

The Battle of Halmyros, known by earlier scholars as the Battle of the Cephissus or Battle of Orchomenos,

Walter of Brienne against the mercenaries of the Catalan Company, resulting in a decisive victory
for the mercenaries.

Engaged in conflict with their original employers, the

, according to an earlier interpretation). The Catalans were considerably outnumbered and weakened by the reluctance of their Turkish auxiliaries to fight. The Company did have the advantage of selecting the battleground, positioning themselves behind marshy terrain, which they further inundated. On the Athenian side, many of the most important lords of Frankish Greece were present and Walter, a prideful man and confident in the prowess of his heavy cavalry, proceeded to charge headlong against the Catalan line. The marsh impeded the Frankish attack and the Catalan infantry stood firm. The Turks re-joined the Company and the Frankish army was routed; Walter and almost the entire knighthood of his realm fell in the field. As a result of the battle, the Catalans took over the leaderless Duchy of Athens; they ruled that part of Greece until the 1380s.

Background

Following the

Walter of Brienne, as successor.[5]

At that time the Greek world was in turmoil owing to the actions of the Catalan Company, a group of mercenaries, veterans of the War of the Sicilian Vespers, originally hired by the Byzantine Empire against the Turks in Asia Minor. Mutual suspicion and quarrels led to war with the Byzantines; evicted from their base in Gallipoli in 1307, the Catalans fought and pillaged their way west through Thrace and Macedonia, until, pressed by Byzantine troops under Chandrenos, they entered Thessaly in early 1309.[6][7][8] The last leader of the company, Bernat de Rocafort, had envisaged the restoration of the Kingdom of Thessalonica with himself at its head, and had even entered into negotiations for a marriage alliance with Guy II. Nothing came of these negotiations, as Rocafort's increasingly despotic rule led to his deposition. After that, the company was ruled by a committee of four, assisted by a twelve-member council.[9] The arrival of the company's 8,000 men in Thessaly caused concern to its Greek ruler, John II Doukas. Having just exploited the death of Guy II to repudiate the overlordship of the Dukes of Athens, John turned to Byzantium and the other Greek principality, the Despotate of Epirus, for aid. Defeated by the Greeks, the Catalans agreed to pass peacefully through Thessaly towards the Frankish principalities of southern Greece.[10]

Walter of Brienne had fought the Catalans in Italy during the War of the Vespers, spoke their language, and had gained their respect. Using this familiarity, he now hired the company for six months against the Greeks, at the high price of four ounces of gold for every heavy cavalryman, two for every light cavalryman, and one for every infantryman, to be paid every month, with two months' payment in advance. Turning back, the Catalans captured the town of

Lord of Salona and Marshal of Achaea, and the barons of Euboea, Boniface of Verona, George I Ghisi, and John of Maisy—as well as reinforcements sent from the other principalities of Frankish Greece.[14]

Battle

Sources and location of the battle

A number of sources report in various degree of detail on the events before and during the battle: chapter 240 of the chronicle of

Nikephoros Gregoras, and brief accounts in Book VIII of the Nuova Cronica of the Florentine banker and diplomat Giovanni Villani, in the Istoria di Romania of the Venetian statesman Marino Sanudo[15] and in letter of the latter that remained unpublished until 1940.[16][17]

Sketch of a medieval seal, with Saint George slaying the dragon in the obverse, and a shield on the reverse
Seal of the Grand Catalan Company, c. 1305

The location of the battle varies in the different sources between two locations. Muntaner reports that it took place "at a beautiful plain near

Lilaia.[15]

Othrys
mountains

The critical examination of the primary sources by more recent scholars has reversed the situation. Muntaner was himself a member of the company until 1307, but was posted as governor of Djerba when the battle occurred and only compiled his chronicle in 1325–1328, leading to some serious errors in his account.[25] Gregoras, although a contemporary of the battle, wrote his history even later, in 1349–1351, relying mostly on second-hand sources; his understanding of the company's activities during the years before the battle is sketchy and inaccurate, and his account of the battle itself is very close to that of Muntaner, indicating perhaps that Gregoras drew on a Western source.[26] On the other hand, the original French version of the Chronicle of the Morea, on which all other versions draw, was written between 1292 and 1320, and the abridged French version surviving today was compiled shortly after by a well-informed author in the Morea. The Greek and Aragonese versions, compiled later in the century, contain essentially the same information as the French version.[27] A critical piece of evidence was the discovery and publication in 1940 of a 1327 letter by Marino Sanudo, who was a galley captain operating in the North Euboean Gulf on the day of the battle. Sanudo clearly states that the battle took place at Halmyros ("... fuit bellum ducis Athenarum et comitis Brennensis cum compangna predicta ad Almiro"), and his testimony is generally considered reliable.[16][17] As a result, more recent historical studies commonly accept Halmyros as the site of the battle.[16][18][28][29][30]

Course of the battle

According to the Chronicle of the Morea, the Catalan army comprised 2,000 cavalry and 4,000 infantry,

horse archers; serving under their own leaders, the Turks were divided into two contingents, one of Anatolian Turks under Halil, which had joined the Company in 1305, and another under Malik, who had defected from Byzantine service shortly after the Battle of Apros. The members of the latter had been baptized as Christians.[33] The sources differ considerably on the size of Walter's army: Gregoras reports 6,400 cavalry and 8,000 infantry, and the Chronicle of the Morea puts it at "more than" 2,000 cavalry and 4,000 infantry, while Muntaner asserts that it comprised 700 knights and 24,000 infantry, the latter mostly Greek. Modern scholars consider these numbers to be exaggerated, but they do suggest that the Athenian army had numerical superiority over the Catalans.[12][34]

last testament
, written on 10 March 1311

Faced with a numerically superior but less experienced enemy, the Company assumed a defensive position, taking care to select a battleground that favoured them.[12] The Catalans chose a naturally strong position, protected by a swamp which, according to Gregoras, they enhanced by digging trenches and inundating them with water diverted from the nearby river. The Catalans took up positions on dry ground behind the swamp, arranging themselves in a solid line but the sources give no further details as to their dispositions.[35][36] The Athenian army assembled at Zetouni (modern Lamia). On 10 March 1311, Walter of Brienne composed his testament there and led his army forth.[37][38] The presence of the Frankish army at Zetouni at this time is a further testimony in favour of locating the battle at Halmyros, as Zetouni lies north of the Cephissus but southwest of Halmyros. For Muntaner's and Gregoras' accounts to be correct, the Catalans would have to be behind the Duke's army; Gregoras furthermore writes that the Catalans passed through the Thermopylae to arrive in Boeotia, which is extremely unlikely given the presence of strong Frankish garrisons at Zetouni and Bodonitsa.[39]

On the eve of battle, the 500 Catalans in the Duke's service, stricken by conscience, went to him and asked for leave to rejoin their old comrades-in-arms, saying they would rather die than fight against them. Walter reportedly gave them permission to leave, replying that they were welcome to die with the others.[35][40] The Turkish auxiliaries took up a separate position nearby, thinking the quarrel was a pretext arranged by the Company and the Duke of Athens to exterminate them.[35]

Walter was reputed for his bravery, bordering on recklessness, and was confident of success, as evidenced by his haughty reply to the 500 mercenaries.[41] Walter's pride and arrogance, combined with his numerical advantage and his innate belief in the superiority of heavy noble cavalry over infantry, led him to fatally underestimate the Catalans and order a charge, even though the terrain was adverse to cavalry.[42] Impatient for action, according to Muntaner, Walter formed a cavalry line of 200 Frankish knights "with golden spurs", followed by the infantry, and placed himself with his banner in the vanguard. The Frankish attack failed but the reason is unclear; Muntaner's description is short and provides no details, while in Gregoras, the heavy Frankish cavalry got stuck in the mud, with the Almogavars, lightly armed with swords and darts, dispatching the knights encumbered in their heavy armour. This is the commonly accepted version among scholars as well. The Chronicle of the Morea implies that the battle was hard-fought—which, as military historian Kelly DeVries notes, seems to contradict Gregoras—and that the marsh possibly merely reduced the impact of the charge, instead of bogging it down entirely. It is clear that the Catalans defeated the charge and that the Duke and most of his men fell. As the two lines clashed, the Turkish auxiliaries realised there was no treachery and descended from their camp upon the Athenian army, panicking and routing its remnants.[43][44]

Gregoras reports that 6,400 cavalry and 8,000 infantry fell in the battle, the same number he gives for Walter's forces. According to Muntaner, 20,000 infantry were killed and only two of the seven hundred knights survived the battle,

Church of Santa Croce.[46]

Aftermath

The battle was a decisive event in the history of Frankish Greece;

Argos and Nauplia in the Peloponnese remained in the hands of Brienne loyalists.[49][50] The Catalans divided the territory of the Duchy among themselves. The decimation of the previous feudal aristocracy allowed the Catalans to take possession relatively easily, in many cases marrying the widows and mothers of the very men they had slain in Halmyros.[51] The Catalans' Turkish allies, however, refused the offer to settle in the Duchy. The Turks of Halil took their share of the booty and headed for Asia Minor, only to be attacked and almost annihilated by a joint Byzantine and Genoese force as they tried to cross the Dardanelles a few months later. The Turks of Malik entered the service of the Serbian king Stefan Milutin, but were massacred after rebelling against him.[52][53]

Lacking a leader of stature, the Catalan Company turned to their two distinguished captives; they asked Boniface of Verona, whom they knew and respected, to lead them, but after he declined, chose Roger Deslaur instead.

Briennist attempt to recover the Duchy in 1331–1332.[56][57] In the 1360s, the twin duchies were plagued by internal strife, were locked in a quasi-war with Venice, and increasingly felt the threat of the Ottoman Turks, but another Briennist attempt to launch a campaign against them in 1370–1371 came to naught.[58][59] It was not until 1379–1380 that Catalan rule faced its first serious setback, when the Navarrese Company conquered Thebes and much of Boeotia. In 1386–1388, the ambitious lord of Corinth, Nerio I Acciaioli, captured Athens and claimed the Duchy from the Crown of Aragon. With his capture of Neopatras in 1390, the era of Catalan rule in Greece came to an end.[60][61]

In military history, the battle was part of a major shift in European warfare, which began with the Battle of the Golden Spurs in 1302: it signalled an era where infantry successfully challenged the traditional predominance of knightly heavy cavalry.[62][63]

References

  1. ^  Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Almogávares". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.
  2. ^ Longnon 1969, pp. 235ff.
  3. ^ Lock 2013, p. 31.
  4. ^ Miller 1908, p. 232.
  5. ^ Miller 1908, pp. 219–221.
  6. ^ Miller 1908, pp. 214–219, 221–222.
  7. ^ Setton 1975, p. 169.
  8. ^ DeVries 1996, pp. 58–59.
  9. ^ Miller 1908, pp. 217–219.
  10. ^ Miller 1908, pp. 222–223.
  11. ^ a b Miller 1908, pp. 223–224.
  12. ^ a b c d DeVries 1996, p. 61.
  13. ^ Setton 1975, p. 170.
  14. ^ Miller 1908, pp. 224–225.
  15. ^ a b Bon 1969, pp. 187–188 (note 4).
  16. ^ a b c d Kalaitzakis 2011, 4.1. Τόπος και χρόνος.
  17. ^ a b Jacoby 1974, pp. 222–223, 226.
  18. ^ a b c Setton 1976, p. 442 (note 3).
  19. ^ Jacoby 1974, pp. 223–224.
  20. ^ Miller 1908, p. 229 (note 3).
  21. ^ a b Jacoby 1974, p. 223.
  22. ^ Miller 1908, pp. 226–229.
  23. ^ Topping 1975, p. 107.
  24. ^ Fine 1994, pp. 242, 244.
  25. ^ Jacoby 1974, p. 224.
  26. ^ Jacoby 1974, pp. 224–225, 229.
  27. ^ Jacoby 1974, pp. 225–226.
  28. ^ Nicol 1993, p. 135.
  29. ^ Lock 2006, pp. 125, 191.
  30. ^ Loenertz 1975, pp. 121–122.
  31. ^ DeVries 1996, p. 60.
  32. ^ Kalaitzakis 2011, 4.2. Οι δυνάμεις των αντιπάλων.
  33. ^ Jacoby 1974, pp. 230–232.
  34. ^ Miller 1908, p. 225.
  35. ^ a b c DeVries 1996, p. 62.
  36. ^ Miller 1908, p. 226.
  37. ^ Miller 1908, pp. 226–227.
  38. ^ Jacoby 1974, p. 228.
  39. ^ Jacoby 1974, pp. 228–229.
  40. ^ Miller 1908, p. 227.
  41. ^ Miller 1908, p. 221.
  42. ^ DeVries 1996, pp. 62, 64–65.
  43. ^ DeVries 1996, pp. 63–64.
  44. ^ Miller 1908, pp. 227–228.
  45. ^ a b DeVries 1996, p. 64.
  46. ^ a b c Miller 1908, p. 228.
  47. ^ Jacoby 1974, pp. 229–230.
  48. ^ Miller 1908, pp. 228–229.
  49. ^ Miller 1908, pp. 229–231.
  50. ^ Setton 1975, p. 171.
  51. ^ Lock 2013, pp. 14, 120–121.
  52. ^ Miller 1908, p. 231.
  53. ^ Jacoby 1974, pp. 232–234.
  54. ^ Miller 1908, pp. 231–232.
  55. ^ Setton 1975, p. 172.
  56. ^ Miller 1908, pp. 235–248, 261–266.
  57. ^ Setton 1976, pp. 441–453.
  58. ^ Miller 1908, pp. 296–300.
  59. ^ Setton 1976, pp. 453–461.
  60. ^ Miller 1908, pp. 303–325.
  61. ^ Setton 1976, pp. 466–471.
  62. ^ Kalaitzakis 2011, 5. Οι συνέπειες και η σημασία της μάχης.
  63. ^ DeVries 1996, pp. 191–197.

Sources

Primary accounts