Roger of San Severino

Roger of San Severino ( Italian Ruggiero di Sanseverino ; † 1285 ), Count of San Severino and Marsico , was an Italian nobleman of Norman descent from the House of Sanseverino in the Kingdom of Sicily and Naples . For King Charles I of Anjou he was the deputy regent ( Bailli ) in the Kingdom of Jerusalem ( Acre ).

His father, Thomas (Tommaso) von San Severino, was enemies with Emperor Friedrich II and had to go into exile in the Papal States. Roger and his older brother Wilhelm (Guglielmo) also opposed the Hohenstaufen rule and therefore supported Charles of Anjou in the conquest of the Kingdom of Sicily and fought against King Manfred in the battle of Benevento in 1266 . He was married to Teodora di Aquino, a sister of the famous church scholar Thomas Aquinas . Their son was Count Tommaso di San Severino, who founded the Charterhouse of Padula in 1306 . In 1271 Roger was appointed vicar in Rome by King Charles .

In March 1277, Charles of Anjou had with the mediation of Pope John XXI. bought her more than thin claim to the crown of Jerusalem from the princess Maria of Antioch and thus declared herself king of Jerusalem. Roger was appointed to his deputy (Bailli) and sent with a fleet to Acre, where he arrived in September 1277. The actual reigning king recognized by the barons of Jerusalem was Hugo III. of Cyprus , whose Bailli in Acre was again Balian of Ibelin . With the support of the Templars , the Venetians and the French regiment, however, Roger had superior military strength at his side, which forced Ibelin to surrender. Thus he was able to establish the Angevin rule in Acre, the actual capital of the kingdom, which only commanded a narrow strip along the coast of Palestine . Here, however, Roger was in fact isolated, as the remaining barons in Tire and Beirut continued to recognize the king of Cyprus.

Roger continued the positive contacts with the Mamluk Sultanate of Cairo that Karl von Anjou had already established. In October 1281 he personally visited Sultan Qalawun in his field camp to congratulate him for the victory that the Mameluks had won over a Mongolian army at Homs . After the outbreak of the Sicilian Vespers in May 1282, Roger was called by Charles of Anjou from Acre to help him in the fight against Aragón in Italy. Roger left the Holy Land in September 1282, leaving his Seneschal Odo Poilechien as the new Bailli, who, however, had to give up the Angevin rule in Acre in 1286.

literature

• Steven Runciman : A History of the Crusades 3 volumes. Reprinted edition. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge et al. 1951-1954.
• Kenneth M. Setton, Harry W. Hazard, Norman P. Zacour, Marshall Whithed Baldwin, Robert Lee Wolff (Eds.): A History of the Crusades. Volume 2: Robert Lee Wolff, Harry W. Hazard (Eds.): The Later Crusades, 1189-1311. University of Wisconsin Press, Madison WI et al. 2005, ISBN 0-299-04844-6 .

Individual proof

1. ↑ L'Estoire de Eracles empereur. In: Recueil des historiens des croisades . Historiens Occidentaux. Volume 2. Imprimerie Impériale, Paris 1859, pp. 478-479 , Liv. XXXIV, Cap. XXXIII.

Web link

• Ruggiero di Sanseverino at fmg.ac (English)

predecessor	Office	successor
Balian from Ibelin	Bailli of Jerusalem (Acre) 1277–1282	Odo Poilechien