The Franks in the Aegean: 1204-1500 - Paperback

by Peter Lock (Author)

Despite the enormous literature on the crusades, the Frankish states in the Aegean (set up in the wake of the Fourth Crusade in 1204) have been seriously neglected by modern historians. Yet their history is both compelling in itself - these were the last crusader states to be set up in the eastern Mediterranean and among the last to fall to the Turks - and also valuable for the case study they offer in medieval colonialism. Peter Lock surveys the social, economic, religious and cultural aspects of the region within a broad political framework, and explores the clash of cultures between the Frankish interlopers and their Byzantine subjects. This is a major addition to crusading studies.

Back Jacket

In 1204, at the climax of the Fourth Crusade, the western Latin army seized Constantinople, the capital city of the Byzantine Empire, from their fellow Christians. Although the Latin Empire they established there was ephemeral (Constantinople was back in Byzantine hands by 1261), six other Latin states were established along the western shores of the Aegean during its brief lifetime. Those states, and the Latin military caste who set them up and kept them going, are the subject of this impressive survey, the first comprehensive study of the Frankish Aegean since the early years of this century.