Key Facts
- Catalan mercenaries hired
- 6,500
- Turkish dead at Philadelphia
- 18,000
- Catalans massacred at Gallipoli
- 1,300
- Roger de Flor assassinated
- 3 April 1305, Gallipoli
- Duration
- 4 years (1303–1307)
Strategic Narrative Overview
The Catalans achieved significant military successes, inflicting a reported 18,000 Turkish casualties at Philadelphia. However, they proved impossible to control, ravaging reconquered lands as well as Byzantine territory. The crisis deepened when Roger de Flor was assassinated on 3 April 1305, followed by a massacre of 1,300 Catalans. The surviving mercenaries then waged a systematic two-year retaliatory pillage across Thrace and Macedonia under Berenguer d'Entença, prompting Pope Clement V to excommunicate the Company.
01 / The Origins
By the early fourteenth century, the Byzantine Empire faced mounting Turkish pressure in Asia Minor. Emperor Andronicus II Palaeologus, lacking sufficient imperial troops, turned to foreign mercenaries for relief. In 1303 he hired the Catalan Company—6,500 soldiers under Roger de Flor—to campaign against Turkish forces. The arrangement reflected Byzantine military weakness and desperation, as the empire was willing to pay heavily for effective fighters to recover lost Anatolian territory.
03 / The Outcome
The campaign ended with the Catalans moving westward rather than continuing service against the Turks. By 1311 they seized the Duchy of Athens, which they held until 1379. Byzantium was left economically and militarily weakened. Turkish forces subsequently reoccupied lands that had been briefly lost, and local populations who had suffered under the Catalans offered little resistance to them, accelerating Turkish consolidation in Anatolia.
Belligerents & Mobilization Analysis
Side A
1 belligerent
Roger de Flor, Berenguer d'Entença, Andronicus II Palaeologus.
Side B
1 belligerent
Michael IX Palaeologus.
Kinetic Engagement Axis
Scroll horizontally to view full axis. Events plotted relatively.