Year 1153 (MCLIII) was a common year starting on Thursday of the Julian calendar.
The Eighth Crusade was the second Crusade launched by Louis IX of France, this one against the Hafsid dynasty in Tunisia in 1270. It is also known as the Crusade of Louis IX Against Tunis or the Second Crusade of Louis. The Crusade did not see any significant fighting as Louis died of dysentery shortly after arriving on the shores of Tunisia. The Treaty of Tunis was negotiated between the Crusaders and the Hafsids. No changes in territory occurred, though there were commercial and some political rights granted to the Christians. The Crusaders withdrew back to Europe soon after.
Andrea Doria, Prince of Melfi was a Genoese statesman, condottiero, and admiral, who played a key role in the Republic of Genoa during his lifetime.
The Barbary pirates, Barbary corsairs, Ottoman corsairs, or naval mujahideen were mainly Muslim pirates and privateers who operated from the largely independent Barbary states. This area was known in Europe as the Barbary Coast, in reference to the Berbers. Slaves in Barbary could be of many ethnicities, and of many different religions, such as Christian, Jewish, or Muslim. Their predation extended throughout the Mediterranean, south along West Africa's Atlantic seaboard and into the North Atlantic as far north as Iceland, but they primarily operated in the western Mediterranean. In addition to seizing merchant ships, they engaged in razzias, raids on European coastal towns and villages, mainly in Italy, France, Spain, and Portugal, but also in the British Isles, and Iceland.
The Republic of Genoa was a medieval and early modern maritime republic from the years 1099 to 1797 in Liguria on the northwestern Italian coast. During the Late Middle Ages, it was a major commercial power in both the Mediterranean and Black Sea. Between the 16th and 17th centuries, it was one of the major financial centres in Europe.
Louis de Bourbon, called the Good, was the third Duke of Bourbon. He was also the Count of Clermont-en-Beauvaisis and Lord of Beaujeu.
Jean de Béthencourt was a French explorer who in 1402 led an expedition to the Canary Islands, landing first on the north side of Lanzarote. From there he conquered for Castile the islands of Fuerteventura (1405) and El Hierro, ousting their local chieftains. Béthencourt received the title King of the Canary Islands but he recognized King Henry III of Castile, who had provided aid during the conquest, as his overlord.
Henry Scrope, 3rd Baron Scrope of Masham KG, also known in older sources as Lord Scrope was a favourite of Henry V, who performed many diplomatic missions. He was beheaded for his involvement in the notional Southampton Plot to assassinate the king. Some historians believe that the charge was trumped-up to punish him for other acts of disloyalty, and that there may never have been such a plot.
The Mahdia campaign of 1087 was a raid on the North African town of Mahdia by armed ships from the northern Italian maritime republics of Genoa and Pisa.
Gadifer de La Salle was a French knight and crusader of Poitevine origin who, with Jean de Béthencourt, conquered and explored the Canary Islands for the Kingdom of Castile.
The War of Saint Sabas (1256–1270) was a conflict between the rival Italian maritime republics of Genoa and Venice, over control of Acre, in the Kingdom of Jerusalem.
The maritime republics, also called merchant republics, were Italian thalassocratic port cities which, starting from the Middle Ages, enjoyed political autonomy and economic prosperity brought about by their maritime activities. The term, coined during the 19th century, generally refers to four Italian cities, whose coats of arms have been shown since 1947 on the flags of the Italian Navy and the Italian Merchant Navy: Amalfi, Genoa, Pisa, and Venice. In addition to the four best known cities, Ancona, Gaeta, Noli, and, in Dalmatia, Ragusa, are also considered maritime republics; in certain historical periods, they had no secondary importance compared to some of the better known cities.
Genoa, Italy, has historically been one of the most important ports on the Mediterranean.
The Venetian–Genoese Wars were four conflicts between the Republic of Venice and the Republic of Genoa which took place between 1256 and 1381. Each was resolved almost entirely through naval clashes, and they were connected to each other by interludes during which episodes of piracy and violence between the two Italian trading communities in the Mediterranean Sea and the Black Sea were commonplace, in a "cold war" climate.
Abu al-Abbas Ahmad II was a Hafsid Caliph of Ifriqiya. He restored the Hafsid kingdom to full power after a period of disarray which followed the invasion of Ifriqiya led by Abu Inan Faris of the Marinids.
The capture of Mahdia was an amphibious military operation that took place from June to September, 1550, during the struggle between the Ottoman Empire and the Spanish Habsburgs for the control of the Mediterranean. A Spanish naval expedition under the command of the Genoese condottiero and admiral Andrea Doria and the Spaniard Bernardino de Mendoza, supported by the Knights of Malta under their Grand Master Claude de la Sengle, besieged and captured the Ottoman stronghold of Mahdia or Mahdiye, defended by the Ottoman Admiral Turgut Reis, known as Dragut, who was using the place as a base for his piratical activities throughout the Spanish and Italian coasts. Mahdia was abandoned by Spain three years later, and all its fortifications were demolished to avoid a re-occupation of the city by the Ottomans.
The Most Serene Prince Antoniotto Adorno was the 6th doge of the Republic of Genoa and rose four times to this supposedly lifelong position, making him the person most often elected to the Doge office in the history of the republic.
The Genoese navy was the naval contingent of the Republic of Genoa's military. From the 11th century onward the Genoese navy protected the interests of the republic and projected its power throughout the Mediterranean and Black Seas. It played a crucial role in the history of the republic as a thalassocracy and a maritime trading power.
The siege of Tortosa was a military action of the Second Crusade (1147–49) in Spain. A multinational force under the command of Count Raymond Berengar IV of Barcelona besieged the city of Tortosa, then a part of the Almoravid Emirate, for six months before the garrison surrendered.
