Demetrius of Monferrat

Demetrius of Monferrato ( Italian: Demetrio di Monferrato ; Greek Δημήτριος Μομφερρατικός , 1205 , Thessaloniki - 1230 , Amalfi ) - king of the Thessaloniki state from 1207 to 1224 .

Demetrius was the son of the Thessalonian king, Marquis Boniface of Monferrat and Margarita , daughter of the Hungarian king Bela III and the widow of the Byzantine emperor Isaac II Angel . As a result of the defeat of the Byzantine Empire during the Fourth Crusade, parts of its territory formed the Latin Empire , which included several crusader states. One of which was the Kingdom of Thessaloniki. Boniface became his first king. The marriage with Margarita strengthened his position and provided support for Byzantium. Demetrius, born in Thessaloniki in 1205, got his name in honor of St. Dmitry of Thessaloniki , the patron saint of Thessaloniki.

In 1207, Boniface died in battle with the Bulgarians, and the Bulgarian king Kaloyan besieged Thessalonica. The siege ended with him dying. Demetrius was to be proclaimed king, but a conspiracy of the Lombard barons was drawn up against him in order to bring to power his half-brother, the Monferratic Marquis Wilhelm VI . This caused discontent of the Emperor of the Latin Empire, Henry I of Flanders , who personally arrived in Thessalonica in 1208 . The barons, headed by Umberto II Biandratsky , closed the city doors in front of him and set a number of demands. Henry dragged on time, pretending to accept the conditions, after which he entered the city, Margarita refused the demands of the barons, and Henry crowned Demetrius on January 6, 1209 . Later, the emperor’s actions were confirmed by Pope Innocent III .

Umberto still controlled the garrisons of the largest crusader fortresses in Aegean Macedonia, such as Serre and Kavala , so Henry was forced to start a war and took Serre, but could not take Kavala. Hoping to reach an understanding, Henry called the knights of Thessalonica kingdom to the parliament in Ravennik, but many knights did not appear. The emperor was forced to continue the war, and ultimately defeated Umberto Biandratsky. In 1210, he also repelled an epirus attack on Thessalonica and left his younger brother Estasius as regent under King Demetrius.

In 1216 , after the death of Henry, the new Latin emperor Pierre de Courtenay took the side of the Lombard barons and appointed King William VI of Monferrato, after which he went to Italy. On the way, he was captured by the Epirusians and was executed by their ruler Theodore Comnenus Duca , so Willem did not take the Thessalonian throne.

In the 1220s, the ruler of Epirus himself, Theodore Comnenus Duca, waged a constant war against the Thessaloniki kingdom, one after another capturing the Thessalonian fortresses. In 1222, he entered into an alliance with William VI, and the latter agreed to send an army, led by Umberto Biandratsky, to the conquest of Thessaloniki. However, even before this army reached Thessaloniki, Theodore himself took the city in December 1224 .

Demetrius, together with the Catholic archbishop, fled to Italy to the court of the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II . He participated with the emperor in the Sixth Crusade and died in 1230 in Amalfi . The formal claims to the Kingdom of Thessalonica after his death passed to Frederick II.