GREAT SIEGE OF MALTA
“THE ORDER’S STRATEGIC POSITION AT MALTA AS A BULWARK FOR LATIN CHRISTENDOM IN THE CENTRAL MEDITERRANEAN ULTIMATELY WOULD PROVE FAR MORE SIGNIFICANT THAN THEIR POSITION AT RHODES”
CENTRAL MEDITERRANEAN SEA MAY-SEPTEMBER 1565
A squadron of seven galleys flying the eight-pointed cross of the Order of Saint John swarmed a heavily laden Ottoman merchant galley in the Ionian Sea in 1564. After a sharp struggle in which the knights overwhelmed the janissaries guarding its precious cargo, Admiral Mathurin Romegas netted plunder worth 80,000 ducats.
The presence of the janissaries was a clue that the cargo did not belong to any ordinary Ottoman merchantman, but rather to Sultan Suleiman I. The vessel was carrying goods from Venice to Istanbul. The cargo belonged to Kustir-Aga, chief eunuch of the imperial harem, who was the agent of a commercial venture established by Mihrimah, the sultan’s daughter, and other members of the imperial harem.
Mihrimah was furious at the loss of the valuable cargo. She pleaded with her father to stop the Christian pirates. Suleiman already had plans to invade Malta, where the Order of Saint John was based, as he wanted to use the island as a staging point for amphibious operations against Italy and Spain. The incident in the Ionian Sea solidified his determination to launch an expedition against Malta.
Christian Corsairs
After the fall of Acre in 1291, which marked the end of the Latin crusader states in the Holy Land, the Order of Knights of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem (Hospitallers) relocated to Cyprus. The knights began to build a fleet with which to harass the southern Turkish coast. They appointed their first admiral in 1301 and began building a small fleet of war galleys. Pope Clement V called on the Order to take Rhodes from the declining Byzantine Empire, which it did in 1310 after a four-year struggle.
The Order then quit Cyprus, where its future was bleak. For the next two centuries the Order thrived at Rhodes, where it continued its transformation into a minor naval power. Following the fall of Constantinople to the Ottomans
