Constantinople, January 6th, 1346
Things had been steadily worsening for Alexios Apokaukos given the repeated defeats of the regency the previous year. Even his own son Manuel the governor of Adrianople had switched sides to Kantakouzenos. Apokaukos had reacted launching a series of proscriptions against suspected supporters of Kantakouzenos. It would not go well for him as relatives of the proscribed would ambush and murder him outside Hagia Sophia on the day of the Epiphany.
Thessaloniki, March 1346
The governor of the city, John Apokaukos declared for Kantakouzenos on the news of the death of his father. It did not go well as the commune of Thessaloniki would rise up again. John would be arrested and executed for his treason along with several more aristocrats supporting Kantakouzenos.
Rhodes, April 15th, 1346
Both the knights, reinforced by the papacy, and the Cypriots had built up their squadrons as match as they could following the second battle of Chios. But Charles III had steadfastly refused to reinforce his squadron in the Aegean either with new ships built in Marseilles and Naples or with additional ships hired from Charles Grimaldi fearing not without reason that they would be picked up piecemeal on their way east. The fleet under Martino Zaccaria still counted 37 galleys. But these were nearly matched in numbers by the 36 galleys to which Michael Philanthropenos had built up his fleet in Greece. If one added the 21 Genoese galleys Theodore had left in the Aegean despite news from his spies that Charles would have 60 galleys in Naples against his own 40, the Lascarids had 57 galleys available in the Aegean. And when Alexios Gryphon had sailed out of Piraeus with the entire fleet and nearly 100 transports in tow, Theodore and Michael had given him a single target on the advice of Alexios Philanthropenos. Not the islands lost in the previous two years. Rather the seat of enemy power, Rhodes itself.
Zaccaria would be forced to give battle, faced with the prospect of the Lascarid army landing on Rhodes unopposed. He would manage to inflict nearly 2,000 casualties on Gryphon but his fleet would lose 16 galleys captured and nearly 3,500 men killed Zaccaria included. The remnants of the Angevin and Cypriot squadrons would flee away, the 13 surviving Angevin ships sailing away first for Karpathos and from there to Corfu, the 3 Cypriot ones back to Cyprus.
The next day a Lascarid army of 5,000 men under Ioannis Buas would land on Ialysos, defeat the Hospitallers attempt to drive it off, the 400 knights in the island first stopped cold by Greek pike allagia and then driven back to Rhodes by Thessalian pronoia cavalry and stradioti. As both sides set themselves for a siege the island's peasantry rose up in support of their fellow Greeks. By summertime the knights remained in control only of the castles of Lindos, Archangelos and Rhodes itself...
Skopje, April 16th, 1346
An assembly of the patriarch of Bulgaria, the archbishop of Ohrid and several Athonite monks proclaimed the archbishop of Serbia Joanikije II patriarch of Serbia. Then the new patriarch proclaimed Stefan Dusan basileus and avtokrator of Serbs and Romans.
Adrianople, May 21st, 1346
Dusan had crowned himself emperor on Easter day. Ioannis Kantakoyzenos would choose Saint Constantine's day for Lazaros patriarch of Jerusalem to crown him basileus. Then for good measure a synod under Lazaros would excommunicate patriarch of Constantinople John XIV. Then two weeks under the coronation Ioannis VI would have his daughter Theodora married off to Orhan the Ottoman emir who had recently absorbed the emirate of Karasi to his realm. Kantakouzenos his army reinforced by Orhan would advance all the way to Selymbria a mere 75km from Constantinople. Anna of Savoy's attempts to find support of her own would fail spectacularly with the army of the despot of Dobrutja crushed by Kantakouzenos and a Turkish army of 6,000 from the emirate of Saruhan defecting to Kantakouzenos after first looting Thrace.
Rhodes, May 27th, 1346
Grand Master Helion de Villeneuve died aged 76. Dieudonne de Gozon who took over command of the knights forces was by all accounts a gallant man who claimed to had slain a dragon in Rhodes [1] This wasn't making his supply situation with Rhodes closely blockaded by 30 galleys on the seaward side and Buas on the landward side any better. And Buas unfortunately for De Gozon was not showing any hurry. After all he had plenty of supplies. Why lose men assaulting the fortifications the previous grand masters had reinforced? His siege engines had of course kept the walls under constant fire lest the defenders get any ideas, he had even used a couple odd contraptions brought from Sicily that made more noise and smoke than actual damage on the walls but otherwise he waited on the city to starve or someone to open a gate to him...
Lindos, June 6th, 1346
The Acropolis of Lindos was thought, not without reason, impregnable to assault. The 200 Eurytanians and Albanians that managed to climb the cliff on which the fortress was built in the dead of night had help from within from a number of bought over guards, while most of rest of the garrison was too complacent in their knowledge of the impregnability of the fort. This didn't make their feat, it would be written later that Buas had been inspired by reading about Alexander's similar feat at Sogdiane Petra, any less impressive.
Lindos, courtesy Wikipedia
Messina, June 20, 1346
3,000 Moreot and Acarnaniam infantry and 1,000 cavalry under Manuel Rallis joined by 3000 Calabrians under Alexandros Doukas Lascaris before marching west to join Theodore's army already marching and counter-marching against Charles third invasion of Sicily.
Calabria, July 1346
Louis of Taranto led the third invasion of Calabria. He would not make any spectacular gains. He would make much greater gains than that idiot Andrew had made the past two years. That he faced much lighter resistance than the previous two years did not go unnoticed though. Alexandros and most of his army were nowhere to be seen. He did not fail to send the information to Charles in Sicily.
Mela river, Sicily, August 10, 1346
Not unsurprisingly both armies had concentrated their efforts at recovering in the case of Theodore or holding in the case of Charles Milazzo. what differed was that after two years of refusing to offer battle Theodore Doukas Lascaris, reinforced from his Greek holdings had finally decided to stand and fight. This wasn't a challenge Charles III was not going to accept when he had been seeking a decisive battle for the past two years. Apparently Theodore matched him now in numbers but Charles III had more than 4,000 men at arms and nearly 9,000 foot soldiers most of them heavily armed infantrymen and crossbowmen in the Italian fashion. Theodore's army was no different with about a third being cavalry, but notably most of his cavalry was light horse unlikely to stand up to a charge by his heavier knights.
Charles is off in his estimations, if not extremely so, Theodore by now has 17,000 men, 12,000 of them infantry. Not unlike its Neapolitan counterpart between a fifth and a quarter are crossbowmen. But over half of the total number are pikemen and the rest while nominally light infantry are heavily armed professionals from the despotate's Greek and Calabrian holdings. Of the cavalry about a third are heavy pronoia cavalry with the balance lighter stadioti. The battle not unlike that of Crecy fought in the same month will be decided by whether Charles heavy horse can carry the day. In many ways Charles men have it better than the ones of his brother in law in France, they do not have to advance into a storm of English arrows, the Sicilian crossbowmen are both fewer in number have less than a third the rate of fire. In others they have it worse as they lack the French numbers. The Neapolitans charge time after time backed by their infantry. And each time they are beaten back by the Sicilian pike allagia. And then Theodore throws his heavy horse into the battle. The Neapolitans are forced to retreat. Retreating in the face of thousands of Stradioti is never an easy proposition.
Mela will not prove the one sided rout Crecy will be, the Sicilians take nearly 3,000 casualties. But many of the wounded Sicilians will live to fight another day. The same is hardly the case for the 5,500 Neapolitans that lie dead on the battlefield. Alexadros was force marching back north the next day with 6,500 men.
Calabria, August 21st, 1346
No one could accuse Louis of Taranto of not having his priorities straight. In the absence of an enemy army he had advanced to raid the silver mines at Longobucco. Then when news of a large enemy army approaching him, he had ordered a retreat before Alexandros could trap him in the mountains. But he would be still forced to give battle north of Cozenza despite being outnumbered. Alexandros would lose about a thousand men. Louis twice as many.
Visegrad, Pest, September 1346
Louis I, king of Hungary was rather unimpressed by the claims of his uncle that the assassins of his brother had been dealt with. Yes the poor idiots that might have done the actual defenestration may have been killed for real. Or not. The mastermind though? His cousin was apparently leading an army in Calabria and remained Charles favorite. That was intolerable. But Louis for now had his hands tied down by the Venetian siege of Zara. He would bide his time for now. After all if the news he was receiving were accurate uncle Charles was doing a fine job to weaken himself at the moment...
Rhodes, October 17th 1346
"You know that by forcing the order to surrender the island, you prove you are schismatics, no better than infidels really."
"I'll remind you his holiness has excommunicated us. And you broke decades of working together with us to attack us with no real excuse. Oh and your ally placed Turkish garrisons on our islands you had taken. Now that we've dealt with your fleet they have declared for the new emir of Aydin. So allow me to remain unimpressed. Terms remain as they are. You surrender Rhodes and leave with your arms unscathed" Gryphon noted coldly. Ioannis Buas just muttered something with a smile in Albanian.
"What has he said?"
Buas smiled again before switching to perfect Italian, he had been raised in the Lascarid court after all. "That you should have confined yourself to hunting imaginary dragons, instead of attacking us"
Navarre, November 1346
Joan II, queen of Navarre had some reason to be concerned at the fate of her daughter.
Blanche had been betrothed three times only for the prospective grooms to break the betrothals. The new one was somewhat unexpected given the contacts of her family with the French throne. And was not offering immediate political gain although it was potentially useful further down the road, checking the ambitions of the two major Iberian kingdoms or for that matter the Angevins. And what better prospect could appear but the sole heir of a king in all but name even one fought, unsuccessfully it appeared by the Angevin cousins? Joan had already signed a treaty with Edward III after Crecy. Signing a marriage contract with George Chrysafis, Theodore's envoy for the marriage of Alexandros and Blanche was easier to shallow....
[1] The skull of which was supposed to be on display till 1837. I really wonder what poor beast had been declared a dragon and how it had found its way on the island.
