King of Cyprus and Jerusalem (1285-1324), the last Frankish king to rule on the mainland of Palestine.
Henry was a younger son of Hugh III, king of Cyprus and Jerusalem, and Isabella of Ibelin. He came to the throne on the death of his older brother, John I. In 1286 Henry regained control over Acre (mod. ‘Akko, Israel) from the supporters of Charles I of Anjou, his rival for the crown of Jerusalem. They had held Acre since 1277, but their position worsened considerably following Charles’s loss of Sicily in 1282 and his death in 1285. This strengthened Henry’s grip on the fragmented kingdom of Jerusalem, but he still failed to prevent the Mamluk conquest of Tripoli (mod. Trablous, Lebanon) in 1289 and of all remaining Frankish possessions in Out-remer, including Acre, in 1291.
Thereafter, Henry organized seaborne raids from his kingdom of Cyprus against the mainland of Syria and Palestine in 1300-1301. However, these failed to meet up with Mongol forces attacking Syria, as had been planned, and ended after the Mamluks captured Ruad (mod. Arwad, Syria), a fortified Templar island off Tortosa (1302). Meanwhile, tensions were growing on Cyprus between various competing factions previously based on the mainland. Henry tried to prevent the military orders from acquiring too many estates, provoking the Hospitallers into undertaking the conquest of Rhodes (mod. Rodos, Greece) in 1306-1310 and the Templars into siding with his political opponents, until the order was suppressed in 1308-1313. As competition for Cypriot trade intensified, Henry favored the Venetians in their war (1294-1299) with the Genoese, who later carried out raids near Paphos (mod. Pafos, Cyprus) in 1312 and 1316.
In 1306 these problems resulted in Henry being deposed by one of his younger brothers, Amaury of Tyre, who was supported by most of the Cypriot nobility and the military orders. Amaury styled himself “governor and rector” of Cyprus and forced Henry into retirement. At first Amaury was popular, especially with the Genoese and his brother-in-law, King Oshin of Cilicia. However, Amaury failed to gain permanent recognition of his title either from Henry or from the papacy. From 1308 onward, more and more nobles as well as the Hospitallers switched allegiance. Amaury responded by sending Henry into exile in Cilicia (1309), but in 1310 he was mysteriously murdered and Henry regained power.
Henry’s reign was also dominated by plans for a new crusade to the Holy Land. However, the fact that it never materialized was not entirely disadvantageous to Henry and Amaury because its key backers, the papacy and the French monarchy, supported the claims to Jerusalem maintained by the descendants of Charles I of Anjou. Nevertheless, Henry tried to garner Western support against potential Mamluk attacks by marrying his sister Maria to King James II of Aragon in 1315 and by (officially at least) enforcing the papal embargo on Christian trade with the Mamluks. He was succeeded by Hugh IV, the son of another of his brothers, Guy.
-Kristian Molin
Bibliography
Edbury, Peter, The Kingdom of Cyprus and the Crusades, 1191-1374 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1991).
Hill, George, A History of Cyprus, 4 vols. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1940-1952).
Mas Latrie, Louis de, Histoire de I’tle de Chypre sous le regne des princes de la maison de Lusignan, 3 vols. (Paris: Imprimerie Imperiale, 1852-1861).
World History
