Benedetto I Zaccaria

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Benedetto I Zaccaria (c. 1235 – 1307), Genoese admiral, was the Lord of Phocaea (from 1288) and first Lord of Chios (from 1304), the founder of Zaccaria fortunes in Byzantine and Latin Greece. He was, at different stages in his life, a diplomat, adventurer, mercenary, and statesman.

Benedetto was the second son of Fulcone Zaccaria and one of his wives: Giulietta or Beatrice. Benedetto assisted his brothers Manuele and Nicolino, his cousin Tedisio, and his son Paleologo in their commercial enterprises.

Already by then a successful merchant, Benedetto first appeared as a Genoese ambassador to the Byzantine court in 1264. This was in response to Michael VIII's alliance with the Republic of Venice.[1] After eleven years of negotiations which resulted in a renewed accord between Empire and Genoa, Benedetto first appeared in Constantinople with his brother Manuele (Manel) in 1275, at imperial invitation. It was then that he was first appointed administrator of the mines of Phocea. He built a plantation there, from which he traded with a number of Mediterranean and Asian cities, accumulating considerable wealth. In 1282, still in the emperor's service, he acted as an ambassador to Peter III of Aragon, counselling him to continue the war with Angevins over Sicily.

Benedetto returned to Genoa in 1284 and was created an admiral. He was the principal commander of the Genoese fleet which defeated Pisa at the Battle of Meloria. He commanded a fleet of twenty galleys, separate from the main Genoese fleet and initially hidden from sight. His surprise attack led to a decisive Genoese victory and the permanent decline of Pisa's military and mercantile power.

He participated alongside the Castilians under Sancho IV in a victorious campaign against Morroco. At about the same time, he served Philip IV of France as an admiral, blocking the English and Flemish ports.

Before the Ottoman Turks and the Venetians, the Byzantine emperor Andronicus II Palaeologus appealed for his aid. In 1296, the Venetian admiral Ruggero Morosini razed Phocea.

In 1302, Benedetto was named admiral by Philip of France, in which capacity he conquered the island of Chios (1304), which had thitherto been in the hands of Moslem corsairs. At first, he gave the government of the isle over to his nephew Tedisio. In 1304, he also occupied Samos and Cos, which were almost completely depopulated, and the emperor conceded him sovereignty over those islands and Chios for two years, under Byzantine suzerainty. It is from this date that Benedetto is accounted Lord of Chios and begins his career as a statesman and ruler. In 1306, Tedisio occupied Thasos, then a refuge of Greek pirates.

Benedetto died in 1307 and his brother Manuele in 1309. His son Paleologo succeeded him in Chios and the rest of his possessions. Benedetto's wife was an unnamed woman of some relation to the Palaeologi.

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ Miller, 43.

[edit] Sources

Preceded by
none		 Lord of Chios
1304–1307		 Succeeded by
Benedetto II