Mleh of Armenia

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Mleh of Armenia (died 1175) was prince of the Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia, ruling from 1170 to 1175.

Exiled from Armenia for plotting the assassination of his half-brother Thoros II of Armenia, he went to Antioch and became a Knight Templar. However, he soon after he left for Aleppo to take service with Emir Nur ad-Din, where he is accused by some chroniclers of having converted to Islam. Nur ad-Din supported the ambitions of the disaffected Mleh, and upon the death of Thoros in 1169, sent him into Cilicia with an army. Ruben II was a minor child, and the Regent Thomas could not resist the invasion. He fled to Antioch, where he was murdered on the orders of Mleh; Ruben, left in episcopal custody at Hromgla, was poisoned.

Mleh, while he hated the Latin Crusader princes, also despised the Byzantines, and drew his support from the Islamic states. Nonetheless, his military position was such that he obtained recognition from Manuel I Comnenus as ruler of Cilicia in 1173. At home, he practiced all manner of extortion and tyranny and accumulated a great deal of wealth. In 1175, his barons seized an opportunity and murdered him in Sis, summoning his nephew Ruben III to take the throne.