Qualla: Siege of Rhodes (1444)

Siege of Rhodes (1444): Introduction

Fri, 24 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit McKarri 09:47, 17. Jan. 2012 (CET), CC BY-SA 3.0 de. The Mamluk Sultanate of Cairo, by 1444, had problems that needed a victory to solve. Plague had thinned its population. Tax revenues were falling. Knights of the Hospital, sailing from Rhodes under the cross of Saint John, kept raiding Mamluk merchant shipping and enforcing a papal ban on Christian trade with Mamluk Egypt that was strangling Alexandrian commerce. Sultan Jaqmaq's commander Aynal Gecut sailed for Rhodes with 85 ships in August expecting that a quick siege of the Hospitaller capital would settle the matter. Six weeks later, Aynal would order his fleet to weigh anchor and sail back to Egypt, having accomplished nothing his sultan had asked for.

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Siege of Rhodes (1444): Why the Knights Were on Rhodes

Fri, 24 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit MarkusMark, CC BY-SA 3.0. Founded in Jerusalem in 1070 to operate a hospital for pilgrims, the Order of the Hospital had transformed itself over the next two centuries into one of Christendom's most effective military religious orders. The Fall of Acre in 1291 ended the Crusader states and forced the Knig...

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Siege of Rhodes (1444): The Mamluks Land

Fri, 24 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit McKarri 09:47, 17. Jan. 2012 (CET), CC BY-SA 3.0 de. Aynal Gecut started the campaign on Kastellorizo, a small Hospitaller outpost halfway between Rhodes and Cyprus, where his men razed the castle before sailing on. On August 10, 1444, his 85 ships appeared in the channel between Rhodes and the Anatolian mainland. The Mamluks lande...

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Siege of Rhodes (1444): The Counterattack at Mandraki

Fri, 24 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit McKarri 09:47, 17. Jan. 2012 (CET), CC BY-SA 3.0 de. Once the gate of Agios Antonios held against the artillery and the Knights had reorganized, Grand Master Jean de Lastic ordered a counterattack at Mandraki. French and Catalan Knights pushed the Mamluks out of the harbor area, killing many and forcing the rest to flee. The fighti...

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Siege of Rhodes (1444): The Knights Let Them Go

Fri, 24 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit McKarri 09:47, 17. Jan. 2012 (CET), CC BY-SA 3.0 de. Jean de Lastic proposed a sally to disrupt the embarkation, fall on the Mamluks while they were divided between ship and shore, and inflict another defeat to make the lesson stick. His military council rejected the plan. The Knights lacked the manpower to risk it; if even part of...

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Siege of Rhodes (1444): What Came After

Fri, 24 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit McKarri 09:47, 17. Jan. 2012 (CET), CC BY-SA 3.0 de. The 1444 siege seemed at the time to confirm the strength of Hospitaller Rhodes. Grand Master Jean de Lastic had defended his island. Allies including Alfonso V of Aragon, the Duke of Burgundy Philip the Good, and Pope Eugene IV had supplied the auxiliary ships and provisions tha...

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