Walter V, Count of Brienne

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Walter V
Roman Catholic

Walter V of Brienne (

Treaty of Caltabellotta
in 1302.

Walter settled in France and married

Frankish Greece, but the Catalans inflicted a crushing defeat on the Franks in the Battle of Halmyros
. Walter died in the battlefield and the Catalans occupied the Duchy of Athens.

Early life

Born around 1275, Walter was the only son of

Guy I of Athens—brought Peloponnesian estates into the marriage.[5] She died in 1279.[6]

Historian Guy Perry describes Walter as a "veritable child" of the War of the Sicilian Vespers (1282–1302).[7] His father, who was a military commander of King Charles II of Naples, fell into captivity in the Battle of the Counts on 23 June 1287.[8] Hugh was released only after he ceded Walter as a hostage to the Aragonese admiral, Roger of Lauria, to guarantee the payment of his ransom.[9] Walter was kept in the fortress at Augusta for years.[9] He most probably learnt Catalan and became familiar with the Aragonese customs during the years of his captivity.[7]

Walter was still held in custody when his father died fighting against Lauria at Brindisi in the summer of 1296.[7] King Charles II ordered Hugh's southern Italian vassals to swear fealty to Walter on 27 August.[10] After being released, Walter went to France and took possession of his father's French domains.[11] He was invested with the County of Brienne before May 1297.[11]

Warlike aristocrat

Seeking revenge for his father's death, Walter made an alliance with two French noblemen whose fathers had also been murdered in Italy.

Treaty of Caltabellotta was signed in 1302, ending the War of the Sicilian Vespers, Walter was released. He went to France before June 1303.[12] His subsequent marriage to Joanna of Châtillon, the daughter of the constable of France, strengthened his position in France.[12]

Duke of Athens

On 5 October 1308, the duke of Athens, Guy II, died childless.[6][13] His two cousins, Walter and Eschiva of Ibelin, laid claim to the duchy.[6][13] Eschiva was the daughter of Alice de la Roche, who was the elder sister of Walter's mother, but the High Court of the Principality of Achaea—the feudal suzerain of Athens—ruled in Walter's favor, saying that the male claimant was to be preferred against a female if two relatives of equal degree claimed an inheritance.[6][13] Before departing for Athens, Walter appointed his father-in-law, Gaucher V de Châtillon, to administer the County of Brienne.[13]

Walter landed at

Byzantine emperor Andronikos II Palaiologos, and the actual ruler of Epirus, Anna Palaiologina Kantakouzene, supported John II, forcing Walter to seek external assistance.[13][14] The Catalan Company—a group of unemployed mercenaries—had made regular raids against Thessaly since 1305.[6] Walter hired the Catalans and their Turkish allies to fight against the Greek rulers.[14][15] The mercenaries invaded Thessaly and occupied important fortresses.[15][16] After six months, John II was forced to sue for peace.[15]

Walter owed the mercenaries four months' salaries, but he did not want to pay the arrears.[14] He selected 200 horsemen and 300 almogàvars (lightly-armed foot soldiers) from among the Catalans and promised only to them to pay their wages.[14] He also offered fiefs to them and ordered all other Catalans to leave the duchy.[14] The dismissed mercenaries refused to move and requested Walter to allow them to settle in the newly conquered lands as his vassals.[15] Walter did not trust the Catalans and threatened them with capital punishment if they did not obey his commands.[15] Having nowhere else to go, the disbanded mercenaries rose up in open rebellion.[14] The 500 Catalan mercenaries whom Walter had just hired joined their compatriots, forcing Walter to seek assistance from Achaea and other parts of Frankish Greece.[14]

Walter's army met the Catalans in a marshy plain at

Halmyros on 15 March 1311.[17][18] The Catalans were willing to make peace, but Walter was determined to get rid of them.[17] At the ensuing Battle of Halmyros, the Catalans won a devastating victory, killing Walter and almost all of his cavalry.[17] The Catalans occupied the Duchy of Athens, and Walter's son, who was taken to Italy after the Catalans' victory, made unsuccessful attempts to regain it in the following decades.[19][20] A Turkish soldier decapitated Walter's corpse and took his head in triumph from the battlefield.[21] His son seized Walter's severed head and buried it in Lecce, most probably in the church of Sant'Oronzo, in 1348.[22]

Genealogical table

Walter's kinship with the dukes of Athens,[5] counts of Brienne and Lecce,[23] and kings of Cyprus[24]
Elvira of Lecce
Hugh I of CyprusAlice of Champagne
Henry I of Jerusalem
Isabella of Cyprus
Hugh of Brienne
Hugh II of CyprusHugh III of Cyprus
Eschiva of Beirut
Walter V of Brienne

In the year 1306 he married

Jeanne de Châtillon
and had two children:

  • Walter VI of Brienne
    (1302–1356), his successor as count of Lecce and Conversano, as well as the titular duke of Athens
  • Isabella of Brienne
    (died 1360), married Gautier III, lord of Enghien, and claimed her brother's title to Lecce and Conversano on his death.

References

  1. ^ Lock 1995, p. 366.
  2. ^ Perry 2018, pp. 128, 134.
  3. ^ Perry 2018, pp. 99, 119, 129.
  4. ^ Edbury 1994, p. 35.
  5. ^ a b Lock 1995, pp. 364–365.
  6. ^ a b c d e Lock 1995, p. 104.
  7. ^ a b c Perry 2018, p. 134.
  8. ^ Perry 2018, pp. 131–132.
  9. ^ a b Perry 2018, p. 131.
  10. ^ Perry 2018, p. 135 (note 163).
  11. ^ a b c d e Perry 2018, p. 135.
  12. ^ a b c d e f g Perry 2018, p. 136.
  13. ^ a b c d e f Perry 2018, p. 137.
  14. ^ a b c d e f g h Setton 1976, p. 441.
  15. ^ a b c d e Perry 2018, p. 138.
  16. ^ Setton 1975, p. 170.
  17. ^ a b c Perry 2018, p. 139.
  18. ^ Setton 1975, p. 171.
  19. ^ Lock 1995, p. 106.
  20. ^ Perry 2018, p. 142.
  21. ^ Perry 2018, p. 140.
  22. ^ Perry 2018, pp. 177–178.
  23. ^ Perry 2018, pp. xxii–xxiii, xxvi.
  24. ^ Edbury 1994, p. 30.

Sources

  • Edbury, Peter W. (1994). Kingdom of Cyprus and the Crusades. Cambridge University Press.
    ISBN 978-0-521-45837-5
    .
  • Lock, Peter (1995). The Franks in the Aegean, 1204–1500. Longman.
    ISBN 0-582-05140-1
    .
  • Perry, Guy (2018). The Briennes: The Rise and Fall of a Champenois Dynasty in the Age of the Crusades, c. 950–1356. Cambridge University Press.
    ISBN 978-1-107-19690-2
    .
  • ISBN 0-299-06670-3
    .
  • ISBN 0-87169-114-0
    .

External links
Walter V, Count of Brienne
House of Brienne
Born: c. 1278 Died: 15 March 1311
Preceded by
Lecce, and Conversano

1296–1311 		Succeeded by
Walter VI
Preceded by
Duke of Athens

1308–1311 		Succeeded by

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