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 Ch. VI THE CATALANS IN GREECE, 1311—1380 177 
even as she wrote (in March 1317), some two thousand Catalans from the Athenian
duchy were in the city of Negroponte: "We make known to your highness that,
owing to the dissension which has existed between Messer Andrew Comaro [Venetian
lord of Carpathos and of a "sixth" of Euboea] and Boniface of Verona [who
held Caiystus and a "third" of the island] and the understanding reached
between your bailie of Negroponte [Michael Morosini, 131 6-1 317] and Messer
Andrew Cornaro, the said Messer Andrew has made peace and an accord with
the Catalan Company in the duchy of Athens, and has introduced into the city
of Negroponte all told more than 2,000 of the Company on horse and foot.
. . ." The island and city were thus in danger of falling to the Catalans,
which would be a grievous loss to Venice and a peril to Mahaut. She urged
the doge to see to the removal of the Catalan force from the island, and
to instruct the bailie to make neither peace nor an agreement with the intruders.
She also requested the doge to direct Andrew Cornaro to break off his entente
with the Company, which he already regretted. Speed was necessary to deal
with this emergency, "and you know well, my lord, that those people in the
Company will maintain neither faith nor honesty with you nor with us nor
with anyone in the whole world."18 
A year later, on March 17, 1318, John of Gravina, prince of Achaea through
his "marriage" to the unhappy Mahaut of Hainault, wrote to Soranzo complaining
of Don Alfonso Fadrique's offenses against both the Angevins and the Venetians
in Negroponte.19 On the following day both king Robert of Naples and prince
Philip of Taranto, brothers of John of Gravina, sent similar letters to the
doge,20 who replied on April 13 expressing his gratitude for this interest
in Venetian affairs; but even before having received the royal letters, the
republic had had news from Greece concerning Don Alfonso Fadrique's activities.
An envoy had already been sent to king Frederick II of Sicily, Don Alfonso's
father, and the republic hoped that the king would himself put a peaceful
and tranquil end to their 
 18. Dipl., doc. LXXXVI, pp. 105—106; Louis de Mas Latrie, Mélanges
historiques, III (Paris, 1880), no. IV, pp. 32—34 (Documents inédits
sur l'histoire de France); Loenertz, Arch. FF. Praed., XXV, no. 5, p. 104;
Karl Hopf, "Geschichte Griechenlands .," in Ersch and Gruber, Allgemeine
Encyklopadie, LXXXV (1867), 413a (repr. New York, 1960, I, 347a), rather
fanciful. Mahaut calls the Catalans "la Compagne des Castellains [Castilians!]
qui sunt en ducaume de Staines [Athens] "; her letter was dated at Andravida
March 28 (of 1317). Boniface of Verona died before May 8, 1318 (Dipl., doe.
XCIV, pp. 113—114), presumably in the late fall of 1317. 
 19. Dipl., doc. LXXXIX, pp. 108—109. 
 20. Dipl., docs. XC, XCI, pp. 109—110. King Robert wrote again on
June 24 (ibid., doc. XCVII, pp. 116—117).