Bartolomeo was the son of Priam, the castellan of Nauplia. After going to Athens on business, he fell in love with Chiara and sent to have his wife in Venice murdered in order to marry the duchess. The Athenian citizenry, however, mistrusted the two lovers' influence over the young duke and probably feared for his life. They called upon Mehmet II, the Ottoman sultan, to intervene on behalf of the young duke Francis. Bartolomeo and Chiara were summoned to his court at Adrianople and the young duke was taken into the sultan's care while his cousin Francesco II was sent to Athens as a Turkish client duke.
The new duke had Chiara murdered at Megara and Bartolomeo appealed to the sultan for justice. Athens was taken into Turkish hands and Francis II deposed.
Setton, Kenneth M. (general editor) A History of the Crusades: Volume III — The Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries. Harry W. Hazard, editor. University of Wisconsin Press: Madison, 1975.
Setton, Kenneth M. Catalan Domination of Athens 1311–1380. Revised edition. Variorum: London, 1975.
The Duchy of Athens was one of the Crusader states set up in Greece after the conquest of the Byzantine Empire during the Fourth Crusade as part of the process known as Frankokratia, encompassing the regions of Attica and Boeotia, and surviving until its conquest by the Ottoman Empire in the 15th century.
The House of Contarini is one of the founding families of Venice and one of the oldest families of the Italian Nobility. In total eight Doges to the Republic of Venice emerged from this family, as well as 44 Procurators of San Marco, numerous ambassadors, diplomats and other notables. Among the ruling families of the republic, they held the most seats in the Great Council of Venice from the period before the Serrata del Maggior Consiglio when Councillors were elected annually to the end of the republic in 1797. The Contarini claimed to be of Roman origin through their patrilineal descendance of the Aurelii Cottae, a branch of the Roman family Aurelia, and traditionally trace their lineage back to Gaius Aurelius Cotta, consul of the Roman Republic in 252 BC and 248 BC.
Nerio I Acciaioli or Acciajuoli was the actual ruler of the Duchy of Athens from 1385. Born to a family of Florentine bankers, he became the principal agent of his influential kinsman, Niccolò Acciaioli, in Frankish Greece in 1360. He purchased large domains in the Principality of Achaea and administered them independently of the absent princes. He hired mercenaries and conquered Megara, a strategically important fortress in the Duchy of Athens, in 1374 or 1375. His troops again invaded the duchy in 1385. The Catalans who remained loyal to King Peter IV of Aragon could only keep the Acropolis of Athens, but they were also forced into surrender in 1388.
Roger Deslaur or Desllor, a knight from Roussillon in the service of Walter V of Brienne, Duke of Athens, was one of the few men to survive the bloody Battle of Halmyros on 15 March 1311. Captured by the Catalan Company, he accepted the post of rector and marshal of the Company after Boniface of Verona declined it.
Nerio II Acciaioli (1416–1451) was the Duke of Athens on two separate occasions from 1435 to 1439 and again from 1441 to 1451.
Chiara Zorzi or Giorgio, also Clara or Claire, was duchess consort of Athens by marriage to Nerio II Acciaioli, Duke of Athens, and regent of Athens during the minority of her son Francesco I from 1451 until 1454.
Manfred, infante of Sicily, was the second son of Frederick III of Sicily and Eleanor of Anjou.
Francis Zorzi (1337–1388), called Marchesotto, was a member of the Venetian Zorzi family and the Marquess of Bodonitsa in Central Greece from 1345 to his death.
Nicholas II Zorzi or Giorgi was the Margrave of Bodonitsa, a member of the Zorzi family of the Republic of Venice, from 1410 to 1414. He was the last Venetian margrave to actually rule before the Ottoman Turkish conquest.
Nicholas ΙΙΙ Zorzi or Giorgi was the Marquess of Bodonitsa, a member of the Zorzi family of the Republic of Venice, from 1416 to 1436, though the title was purely nominal by then. Before becoming marquess in an exchange with his nephew Nicholas II, he was the baron of Carystus. He was a son of Guglielma Pallavicini and Marquess Nicholas I Zorzi.
Antonio I Acciaioli, also known as Anthony I Acciaioli or Antonio I Acciajuoli, was Duke of Athens from 1403.
Joanna of Châtillon or Joan, French: Jeanne; was the wife of Walter V of Brienne (1305). She was Duchess of Athens by marriage (1308–1311). She was the daughter of Gaucher V de Châtillon, Constable of France and Isabelle de Dreux. Her paternal grandparents were Gaucher IV de Châtillon and Isabelle de Villehardouin. Her maternal grandparents were Robert de Dreux, Viscount of Chateaudun and Isabelle de Villebéon.
Antonio II Acciaioli was the Duke of Athens from 1439 to 1445.
Francis or Francesco I Acciaioli was the son of Nerio II Acciaioli by his second wife Chiara Zorzi. He succeeded on his father's death in 1451 to the Duchy of Athens under his mother's regency.
Amadeus or Amedeo of Savoy was the son of James of Piedmont and his third wife Marguerite de Beaujeu. By James' will of 16 May 1366, he was declared his firstborn and heir. In 1367, he succeeded his father in his titles of Lord of Piedmont and Prince of Achaea. He was also the lord of Pinerolo.
Crusino I Sommaripa was lord of the islands of Paros and later Andros in the Duchy of the Archipelago.
Pietro Zeno, was lord of Andros from 1384 until his death in 1427, and a distinguished diplomat in the service of the Republic of Venice.
The First Ottoman–Venetian War was fought between the Republic of Venice with its allies and the Ottoman Empire from 1463 to 1479. Fought shortly after the capture of Constantinople and the remnants of the Byzantine Empire by the Ottomans, it resulted in the loss of several Venetian holdings in Albania and Greece, most importantly the island of Negroponte (Euboea), which had been a Venetian protectorate for centuries. The war also saw the rapid expansion of the Ottoman navy, which became able to challenge the Venetians and the Knights Hospitaller for supremacy in the Aegean Sea. In the closing years of the war, however, the Republic managed to recoup its losses by the de facto acquisition of the Crusader Kingdom of Cyprus.
Bartholomew II Ghisi was a Latin feudal lord in medieval Greece, lord of Tinos and Mykonos, Triarch of Negroponte and Grand Constable of the Principality of Achaea.
Matthew of Moncada was count of Aderno and Agosta, the grand seneschal of the Kingdom of Sicily under Frederick the Simple.
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