Odo from Montbéliard

Amadeus' coat of arms of Montfaucon

Odo von Montbéliard , also Hugo , (also Heude , Eudes or Otto , * around 1205, † around 1247) was Bailli and constable of Jerusalem and, by marriage, Prince of Galilee .

Odo was the only son of Walter de Montbéliard , regent of Cyprus , and the Burgundy of Lusignan. His maternal grandfather was King Amalrich I of Cyprus . He was married to Eschiva von Saint-Omer , the daughter of Rudolf von Saint-Omer and Agnes Garnier. When her father died in 1219, Eschiva inherited his claims to the Principality of Galilee, which had been occupied by the Ayyubids since 1187 .

Around 1220 Odo had been appointed constable of the Kingdom of Jerusalem by John of Brienne , King of Jerusalem , an office that had held since his father. When King John left the Levant for Italy with his young daughter Isabella II , under whose law he ruled, in 1223, Odo was appointed regent (Bailli) of the kingdom by him. When Isabella II was married to Emperor Frederick II in Brindisi in 1225 , the latter claimed reign over the Kingdom of Jerusalem against the position of John of Brienne based on their rights. Odo initially remained Bailli as the emperor's deputy until he sent his henchman Thomas Aquinas to the Levant who took over the reign in 1227 . But when the death of Queen Isabella II became known in May 1228, the Haute Cour of Jerusalem re-elected Odo to the Bailli for the new king Konrad , who was still under age . Emperor Friedrich II, however, who now claimed the reign on behalf of his son, did not accept this decision. When he landed in Acre on the occasion of his crusade in September 1228 , he appointed Balian of Sidon and Garnier l'Aleman to be his Baillis. Odo, however, retained his office as constable, the emperor confirmed him in this on his departure in April 1229.

During the civil war of the Barone Outremers ( Lombards War ) under the leadership of Johann von Ibelin , the "old gentleman of Beirut", against the imperial rule, Odo initially tended to the imperial side and tried to mediate between the conflicting parties. The appearance of the imperial governor Richard Filangieri , in office since 1231 , who ignored the legal customs of the feudal society Outremers just as the emperor had before, caused him to switch to the side of his peers. In May 1242 he was again elected Bailli by the Haute Cour in Acre, in competition with the imperial governors in Tire, Richard Filangieri and Thomas Aquinas. A year later, in July 1243, Tire fell into the hands of the barons and the imperial rule ended. The Haute Cour now elected Alice of Champagne as the new regent.

In 1239 Odo joined the army of the barons' crusade . Tensions soon arose between the local barons (including Odo) and the commander-in-chief of the crusade Theobald . In the further course of the crusade, however, a diplomatic agreement was reached with the Sultan al-Salih Ismail of Damascus , who, among other things, ceded the Galilee he had occupied to the Kingdom of Jerusalem , which Odo and his wife now received back.

Odos capital of Galilee, Tiberias , was in 1244 by overhauling Khwarazmian irregulars looted, after which Odo had Rebuilding the heavily damaged citadel of Tiberias. On June 17, 1247 Tiberias, including the citadel , was conquered by the army of the Ayyubid sultan of Cairo, al-Salih Ayyub , and most of Galilee was finally lost.

With Eschiva he had three daughters:

• Maria ∞ I) Hugo von Ibelin († 1254/55), son of Balian von Ibelin , Lord of Beirut, ∞ II) Jakob von Ibelin († 1276), Count of Jaffa.
• Johanna († young)
• Simone ∞ Philip of Ibelin , constable of Cyprus, son of Baldwin of Ibelin († 1267), Seneschal of Cyprus.

literature

• David Jacoby: The Kingdom of Jerusalem and the Collapse of Hohenstaufen Power in the Levant. In: Dumbarton Oaks Papers. Vol. 40, 1986, pp. 83-101, doi : 10.2307 / 1291530 .

Web links

• Eudes (Hugues) de Montfaucon at fmg.ac (English)
• Eschiva (III) ∞ Eudes de Montfaucon at fmg.ac (English)

predecessor	Office	successor
Rudolf of Saint-Omer (titular prince)	Titular Prince of Galilee (de iure uxoris ) 1219–1240, 1247	Eschiva of Saint-Omer (titular princess)
Rudolf of Saint-Omer (titular prince)	Prince of Galilee (de iure uxoris) 1240–1247	Eschiva of Saint-Omer (titular princess)
Walter of Montbéliard	Constable of Jerusalem 1220–1244	Philip of Montfort
---	Bailli of Jerusalem 1223-1227	Thomas Aquinas
Thomas Aquinas	Bailli of Jerusalem 1228	Balian of Sidon and Garnier l'Aleman
---	Bailli of Jerusalem (counter-pretender to Richard Filangieri and Thomas Aquinas) 1242–1243	---