Antioch

Who holds it

Name

Bohemond III, with the commune of the burghers

Title

Prince of Antioch

Since

1163

Confidence

high

The prince holds the citadel and the city's lordship; the commune (sworn 1194) speaks for the burghers.

Lord in 1200

Bohemond III, prince of Antioch (restored early 1199); the commune of Antioch governs the burghers' affairs

Allies and rivals

See Antioch and Commune of Antioch.

How things stand that morning

Held by Bohemond III; the commune favours Bohemond of Tripoli; the barons are sworn to Raymond-Roupen.

Wealth

Markets, transit tolls and crafts; no figures.

Military

Walls and citadel; the prince's knights, the commune's men, the military orders.

Threats

• Armenian intervention in the succession
• Earthquakes (the city was damaged in 1170)

Charter

The commune's sworn association of 1194. The Italian communes' privileges: the Genoese have held a quarter since the First Crusade (1098), and the Pisans also have privileges; Bohemond of Tripoli promised the Italian merchants new grants in 1198. Venetian privileges in 1200 are not pinned.

Council

The prince's High Court of the barons; the commune with its assemblies and bell (a mayor is attested later, in 1216); a court of the burgesses under the customs later written down as the Assises of Antioch (general reference).

Communities

Latins (Franks and the Italian communes); Greek Orthodox, the largest Christian community, in the commune; Armenians; Syriac Orthodox (Jacobites), whose patriarch Michael the Syrian, the chronicler, died in November 1199 (general reference); a small Jewish community (about ten families of glass-makers in Benjamin of Tudela's account, about 1170); few Muslims.

Militia

The commune's townsmen help hold the walls (they drove out the Armenians in 1194 and with the Templars hold the citadel against Leo in 1203). No figures.

Walls and castle

The late Roman and Byzantine walls with their towers run from the Orontes up Mount Silpius and Mount Staurin, with the citadel on the summit; gates include the Bridge Gate on the Orontes and the Iron Gate in the ravine (general reference). The circuit is too long for the garrison of 1200.

Trade and crafts

The transit trade from Aleppo and inner Syria down the Orontes to the sea at Saint Simeon; city crafts; glass-making (Benjamin of Tudela, about 1170, found the city's few Jewish families making glass). Silk and other textiles are not pinned for 1200.

What the year holds

What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.

1. April 1201 (later)Bohemond IV is accepted as prince by the commune at his father's funeral; Leo besieges the city.Depends on: Bohemond III's death. Stopped by: A settlement before his death.

Where the sources disagree

Evidence: Its politics in 1194-1201 are well told; its economy and communities in 1200 come from general and earlier evidence.

On the map: The city and its near land only; the plain is the prince's domain (Bohemond III).

Primary sources for Antioch

Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.

• The Chronicle of Ernoul and Bernard the Treasurer, Ernoul, squire of Balian of Ibelin, and later compilers (the 1187 core soon after the event; the whole in its present form 1227 to 1232). The Ibelin household's version of events in Outremer. Read online
• The Cream of the History of Aleppo, Kamal al-Din Ibn al-Adim (about 1240 to 1260). The annals of Aleppo. Read online
• The Old French Continuation of William of Tyre (Eracles), Anonymous continuators, the earliest drawing on Ernoul (about 1220 to 1277; the first continuation (1184 to 1197, the Lyon Eracles) compiled about 1230 from material of the 1190s). For the Latin East at 1200 it narrates the aftermath of the Third Crusade: the truce of 1192, the succession to Jerusalem through Queen Isabella's marriages to Henry of Champagne (died September 1197) and Aimery of Lusignan, Aimery's rule as king of Jerusalem from 1198 while king of Cyprus, the German crusade of 1197 to 1198 and the recovery of Beirut and Sidon, the truce with al-Adil of 1198, the Antioch succession quarrel between Bohemond IV and Leo of Armenia, and the Pisan plot against Aimery. Read online
• The Anonymous Syriac Chronicle to 1234, Anonymous (a Syrian Orthodox writer, probably of Edessa) (about 1234 to 1240). An Edessene chronicle independent of Michael the Syrian in its later part, with a secular section reaching 1234 that gives the Jazira, Edessa, Harran, Mardin and Melitene about 1200 under al-Adil's sons and the Artuqids, the Seljuks of Rum, the Armenians of Cilicia and the Franks of Antioch, and a church section to 1207 on the Jacobite succession after Michael's death in 1199. Read online
• The Chronicle of Michael the Syrian (Michael the Great), Michael the Syrian, patriarch of Antioch 1166 to 1199 (about 1180 to 1195). The Jacobite patriarch's world chronicle, in parallel columns of church, secular and miscellaneous events, ending four years before 1200 and shortly before his own death on 7 November 1199, which left the Syrian Orthodox church with a disputed succession in 1200. Read online
• The Chronicle of Smbat Sparapet (Sempad the Constable), Smbat Sparapet, brother of King Hetum I of Cilicia (about 1270 to 1276). The Cilician court chronicle, drawing on Matthew of Edessa for its early part and on family memory later. Read online
• Calendar of the Acts of the Kingdom of Jerusalem, Various, calendared by Reinhold Rohricht (documents 1097 to 1291; calendar published 1893, Additamentum 1904). A chronological calendar of every charter, letter and treaty of the Latin East then known, with date, parties, witnesses and the edition where each is printed. Read online
• The Registers of Pope Innocent III (pontifical years 1 to 3, 1198 to 1201), Innocent III (Lotario dei Conti di Segni) and the papal chancery (1198 onwards, year by year). The register for the second and third pontifical years (February 1199 to February 1201) holds the letters that set the eastern stage for 1200: the exchange with Kaloyan of Bulgaria opened in December 1199 and continued through 1200 over union with Rome and a crown, letters to Vukan of Zeta and to Stefan of Serbia, letters to Alexios III and the patriarch John Kamateros pressing for church union and help for the crusade, the preaching commissions and the legation of Peter Capuano, the Antioch succession quarrel between Bohemond and Leo of Armenia, letters to Aimery of Cyprus and Jerusalem, and the French interdict over Ingeborg. Read online

4 more in the sources library for The Latin East and the Ayyubids.