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Zacour, N. P.; Hazard, H. W. (ed.) / The impact of the Crusades on Europe
(1989)
V: The Institutions of the Kingdom of Cyprus, pp. 150-174
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Page 154
154 A HISTORY OF THE CRUSADES they nominated titularies of these same offices, as well as an admiral, a turcopolier, a chancellor, and an auditor for the kingdom of Cyprus. In addition, after the seigneurial families of the Holy Land died out, while retaining the titles of the princes of Antioch and Galilee and the counts of Tripoli for their younger sons, Peter I and his successors accorded to their subjects the titles of counts of Edessa and of Jaffa, and lords of Sidon, of Caesarea, and of Beirut. However, these titles did not include any territorial endowment, in contrast to the first titled seigneury created in the kingdom of Cyprus, the county of Carpas (Karpassos; 1472).~ When Guy of Lusignan became lord of Cyprus, he concerned himself with attracting enough Franks to the island to stabilize its occupation and ensure its defense. Some came from the kingdom of Jerusalem or the other principalities of the Latin east, others came from the west, especially from Poitou. He distributed fiefs among them generously (his brother Aimery reputedly reduced the extent of these concessions). It was undoubtedly the domain of the "emperor" Isaac Comnenus, who had deprived numerous members of the Greek aristocracy of their possessions, which was thus parceled out, but many great Greek landholders, especially among the laity, and a number of Venetians were also despoiled — one tradition has it that the archontes had first to surrender half their possessions. In any case, it is certain that no Greek name is encountered among the vassals of the kings of Cyprus in the thirteenth century. 10 Although generous, these feudal grants were never connected with important territories. There were no great seigneuries in Cyprus; most of them included no more than a single village (casal), or else a few scattered villages (one exception being the domain of Marethasa, belonging to the titular count of Edessa in the fifteenth century). Not all of them had even a fortified manor-house with a defense tower. The customs of the kingdom of Jerusalem were imposed with respect to feudal law: only minor differences may be noted (as, for example, the fief being passed on only to the direct descendants of a deceased 9. L. de Mas Latrie, "Les Comtes de Carpas," Bibliothèque de l'Ecole des chartes, XLI (1880), 375 if., and "Documents nouveaux," pp. 421—423; Richard, "Paine d'Orient latin." 10. The "families of archontes which, without titles or arms, comprised a Greek nobility", may have maintained "within the fold of a population hostile to the invaders their rank and their prerogatives of yester-year", to reemerge in the 16th century: vitalien Laurent's review of G. Hill's History of Cyprus in Revue des etudes byzantines, vI (1948), 269. The only Greek "noble" known up to the 16th century is Constant Synkletiko, cited in 1318 in the account book of Psimolófo, but some civil servants of the king or the churches bore names which seem tO indicate a Greek aristocratic extraction.
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