Latest / The Story of Armenia: Survival Through Empires and Genocide — Fexingo History / The Mamluk Sultanate's Conquest of Cilician Armenia
Transcript
- Lucas: Last time we talked about the Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia, we left off with its golden age under Levon II and the Mongol alliance. But that alliance, which seemed so promising, ultimately helped bring down the kingdom. Luna: Wait, really? The Mongols were that powerful? Lucas: The Mongols were a double-edged sword. Cilician Armenia allied with the Ilkhanate against the Mamluks, but when the Ilkhanate converted to Islam and fell into civil war, the Armenians were left exposed. The Mamluks under Sultan Baibars, and later Qalawun, had no love for a Christian kingdom allied with their enemies. Lucas: Baibars was a formidable enemy. He'd already crushed the Crusader states, and in 1266 he launched a devastating raid into Cilicia. The Armenian king at the time, Hethum I, was away at the Mongol court, and his sons were captured—one died, the other became a hostage. That set the tone for the next century. Luna: So the kingdom was slowly being squeezed. Lucas: Exactly. By the early 1300s, the Mamluks were launching raids almost annually. The Armenians lost key fortresses like the port of Ayas, which had been their gateway to European trade. Without that revenue, the kingdom couldn't pay for defenses or hire mercenaries. Lucas: Internal divisions weakened them further. After the death of King Oshin in 1320, there were regencies and power struggles. The Lusignan dynasty, originally from Cyprus, took over through marriage, and they brought Frankish customs that alienated the local Armenian nobility. Luna: So the kings were seen as foreign? Lucas: To a degree. The last king, Levon V—or Leo V, as he's often called—was a Lusignan. He tried to rally support from Europe, but nobody came. By 1374, the Mamluks had had enough. They marched on the capital, Sis, with a massive army. Lucas: The siege of Sis in 1375 was brutal. The city held out for a while, but the walls eventually fell. Levon V was captured and taken to Cairo as a prisoner. He spent years in captivity before being ransomed and ending his days in Paris, where he died in 1393. Luna: So the kingdom simply disappeared? Lucas: Not overnight. Some Armenian lords held out in mountain fortresses for a while, but the Mamluk administration took over. The Catholicos, the head of the Armenian Church, fled to Sis and then to Hromkla, and eventually to Antelias in Lebanon, where he remains today. The cultural heart of Cilicia was ripped out. Lucas: But the memory of Cilician Armenia didn't die. It became a symbol of what was lost—a thriving Armenian state that had traded with Venice and Genoa, that had its own coinage and literature. The fall of Sis is still mourned in Armenian songs and stories. Luna: It's like a lost golden age. Lucas: Exactly. And it shaped the Armenian diaspora. Many Cilician Armenians fled to Cyprus, then to Europe, and later to the New World. They carried with them a sense of having been betrayed by both their Mongol allies and their European co-religionists. Lucas: One name worth remembering is that of the historian Vardan Areveltsi, who chronicled the Mongol period. Or the poet Frik, who wrote about the cruelty of the Mamluks. Their works give us a window into how Armenians experienced those centuries. Luna: What happened to Levon V after he was ransomed? Lucas: He went to Europe, hoping to stir up a new crusade. He visited England, France, and Spain, but got nowhere. He died in Paris and was buried in the Basilica of St. Denis—a quiet end for the last king of an independent Armenian state. Lucas: The title of King of Armenia was later claimed by the Lusignan rulers of Cyprus, and then by the House of Savoy, but it was just a title. Real Armenian statehood wouldn't return until the short-lived First Republic in 1918. Luna: So the fall of Cilicia echoes into modern times. Lucas: Absolutely. It's a story of resilience and betrayal, of a small nation caught between empires. And it reminds us that even when a kingdom falls, its people carry its memory forward.