Leo V of Armenia

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Leo V of Armenia

Leo IV or Leon IV (also numbered Leo V; , Levon IV; 1309 – 28 August 1341) was the last Hethumid king of Cilicia

Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia

The Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia was a state formed in the Middle Ages by Armenian refugees fleeing the Seljuk Turks invasion of Armenia. It was located on the Gulf of Iskenderun of the Mediterranean Sea in what is today southern Turkey....
, ruling from 1320 until his death. He was the son of Oshin of Armenia

Oshin of Armenia

Oshin was king of the Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia, ruling from 1307 to 1320 and a member of the Hetoumids-family.Oshin became king on the death of his nephew Leo III of Armenia and brother Hethum II of Armenia at the hands of Bilarghu, and initiated his reign by raising an army and driving out the Mongols of Bilarghu....
and Isabel of Korikos, and came to the throne on the death of his father.

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Leo IV or Leon IV (also numbered Leo V; , Levon IV; 1309 – 28 August 1341) was the last Hethumid king of Cilicia

Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia

Oshin of Armenia

Oshin of Korikos

Oshin of Korikos served as regent of the Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia from 1320–1329. He was the son of the historian Hayton of Korikos. He became regent for Leo IV of Armenia on the death of Oshin of Armenia in 1320, whom he was rumoured to have poisoned....
. During this period, the kingdom was much harassed by Mamluk

Mamluk

A mamluk was a slavery soldier who converted to Islam and served the Muslim caliphs and the Ayyubid sultans from the 9th to the 13th centuries....
s and Mongols. In 1320, the Egyptian sultan Naser Mohammed ibn Kelaoun invaded and ravaged Christian Armenian

Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia

Cilicia

In antiquity, Cilicia now known as ?ukurova, was a commonly used name of the south coastal region of the Anatolian peninsula, and a political entity in Roman times....
. In a letter dated July 1, 1322, Pope John XXII

Pope John XXII

Pope John XXII , born Jacques Du?ze , was pope from 1316 to 1334. He was the second Pope of the Avignon Papacy , elected by a Papal conclave in Lyon assembled by Philip V of France....
sent a letter from Avignon

Avignon

Avignon is a Communes of France in the Vaucluse Departments of France in southeastern France with an estimated mid-2004 population of 89,300 in the city itself and a population of 290,466 in the aire urbaine at the 1999 census....
to the Mongol ruler Abu Sa'id, reminding him of the alliance of his ancestors with Christians, asking him to intervene in Cilicia. At the same time he advocated that he abandon Islam in favor of Christianity. Mongol troops were sent to Cilicia, but only arrived after a ceasefire had been negotiated for 15 years between Constantin, patriarch of the Armenians, and the sultan of Egypt.

The Regent Oshin had married his stepmother, Jeanne of Anjou, and Leo was forced to marry Oshin's daughter Alice (by his first wife, Margaret d'Ibelin) on August 10, 1321. Oshin murdered a number of members of the royal family to consolidate his own power, and Leo's reaction upon reaching his majority in 1329 was violent. Oshin, his brother Constantine, Constable of Armenia and Lord of Lampron, and Leo's wife Alice were all murdered on the king's orders, the head of Oshin being sent to the Ilkhan and of Constantine to Al-Nasr Muhammad.

Leo was strongly pro-Western and favored a union of the Armenian and Roman

Roman Catholic Church

The Roman Catholic Church, officially known as the Catholic Church is the world's largest Christianity Ecclesia , representing over half of all Christians and one-sixth of the world population....
Churches, which deeply displeased the native barons. His second marriage on December 29, 1331 to Constance, daughter of Frederick III of Sicily

Frederick III of Sicily

Frederick II or III was the regent and subsequently King of Sicily from 1295 until his death. He was the third son of Peter III of Aragon and served in the War of the Sicilian Vespers on behalf of his father and brothers, Alfonso III of Aragon and James II of Aragon....
and Eleanor of Anjou

Eleanor of Anjou

Eleanor of Anjou was the Queen consort of Frederick III of Sicily....
, widow of Henry II of Cyprus, further aroused anti-Western sentiment.

In 1337, Al-Nasr Muhammad invaded again, taking the city of Ayas

Ayas (city)

Ayas is a small town in Yumurtalik, Adana Province, Turkey, located east of the mouth of the Ceyhan River. It was the ancient Aegea and medieval Ajazzo or Lajazzo....
, and Leo was forced to conclude a humiliating truce, surrendering territory and a large indemnity and promising to have no dealings with the West. He spent the last years of his reign holed up in the citadel at Sis

Kozan, Adana

Kozan is capital town of Kozan district in Adana Province, Turkey, 68 km north of the city of Adana, in the northern section of the Adana plain....
, hoping for Western aid. On December 28, 1341 he was murdered by his own barons. His only son by Alice, Hethum, had died before 1331; the barons elected his cousin Guy of Lusignan to succeed him.

Leo V of Armenia

Bibliography