Romegas

Mathurin d'Aux de Lescout , called Romegas or Mathurin Romegas (* 1525 or 1528; † November 4, 1581 in Rome ) was a descendant of the aristocratic Gascogner family d'Aux and a knight of the Order of Malta .

He was one of the best ship commanders in the order and, along with Dragut Rais, one of the best captains of the Mediterranean in his day.

He joined the order in December 1546 and served most of his life on its galleys . The Ottomans feared his attacks at sea, as well as on the coasts of the Levant , the Aegean and the Maghreb .

It gained its first fame in 1555 through a miraculous rescue from a galley that capsized in the port of Malta . The ship was keel-up when the rescue team heard knocking noises from the hull. After punching a hole in the torso, Romegas emerged with his favorite monkey on his shoulder - he had survived in a bubble. This story was testified by his friend and later Grand Master of the Order, Jean Parisot de la Valette . 1564 he conquered before Kefalonia a heavily armed Turkish schooner which the Kustir Aga , the head eunuch of the seraglio of the sultans belonged, and goods worth 80,000 ducats had loaded. Some of these goods also belonged to the favorite daughter of Sultan Suleyman the Magnificent , which finally angered him so much that he ordered the attack on Malta, which then led to the siege of Malta (1565) . Romegas did not play a very important role in this siege, as he returned from a caravan (as the knights called their pirate trains) found the island already under siege, which is why he could not land. During the naval battle of Lepanto in 1571, Romegas commanded the papal flagship .

In 1575 Romegas was appointed Commander-in-Chief of the Galleys of the Order of Malta and shortly thereafter appointed Grand Prior of Toulouse . In 1577 he became lieutenant to the incumbent Grand Master Jean de la Cassière , which made it clear that he would become Grand Master himself one day. In 1581 la Cassiere had so angry the knights against him through various decisions that were perceived as humiliations that he was imprisoned in Fort St. Angelo . Now de facto Romegas led the order. From Pope Gregory XIII. an envoy, Gaspare Visconti, was sent to see how the situation in Malta was developing. Romegas and Cassiere were ordered to Rome in October 1581, where the former is treated with coldness and contempt, which probably contributed to his death on November 4, 1581 in Rome. Cassiere is reinstated, but also dies a month later in Rome.

literature

• Carmel Testa: Romegas . Midsea Books, Valletta 2002, ISBN 99932-39-07-0
• E. Hamilton Currey: Sea-Wolves of the Mediterranean. The Grand Period of the Muslim Corsairs. Nelson, London et al. 1910 ( Nelson Library of Notable Books ).
• Ernle Bradford : The Shield of Europe. The Battle of the Knights of Malta against the Turks in 1565 . Ullstein, Frankfurt am Main et al. 1999, ISBN 3-548-34912-9 ( Ullstein-Buch - Ullstein-Sachbuch 34912), (translated from English, title of the original edition: The Great Siege, Malta 1565. Hodder and Stoughton, London 1961) .