Talk:Guy of Lusignan

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The same here as in page of Sibylla of Jerusalem, see Talk there.

[edit] Marriage

I notice that in popular fiction, Guy is usually portrayed as being forced on Sibylla as a husband. But the Arab chronicler Ibn Al-Athir says that Sibylla had "fallen in love with a man named Guy, a Frank recently arrived from the West. She married him, and when [Baldwin V] died, she gave the throne to her husband." Missi 10:27, 7 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] The Cup...

Wait a minute! I don't recall Saladin knocking the cup away! Didn't he just let Reynald drink, and then declare that he had not given Reynald permission to drink when he had finished? Other Wikipedia articles (such as Reynald's article) make no mention of Saladin interfering before Reynald had quenched his thirst. Did this really happen or not? Roy Al Blue 00:11, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

Well, he either let Raynald drink, then killed him, or didn't let him drink, then killed him, or Raynald refused to drink, then Saladin killed him anyway...depends on the source. I think what we have on Raynald's page currently is probably the most accurate. Adam Bishop 00:36, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Arrival date

I have edited to make the date of Guy's arrival more doubtful. It is only modern historians (and the makers of the film Kingdom of Heaven) who think he was established in Jerusalem long before 1180. I see from the note above that Ibn al-Athir supports Ernoul (whom many dismiss) in suggesting that he was a newcomer there at the time of his marriage. Andrew Dalby http://perso.wanadoo.fr/dalby/ 22:16, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

Fine! We simply don't know for sure when he arrived, certainly after his brother. There doesn't seem to be any reference to where he was/what he was doing in the meantime! Silverwhistle 18:27, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
Well, who are we to argue with modern historians? :) I saw Andrew ask elsewhere if Guy ever witnessed anything before 1180 - that should be a simple matter of looking him up on Rohricht's collection of charters, right?. Adam Bishop 03:35, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
I've got quite a lot of that photocopied, so will check tonight...Silverwhistle 07:37, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
Checked - no Guy pre-marriage. Neither of the Lusignan brothers does witnessing & c., even when we know Amalric was around. Silverwhistle, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
Thank you, I'm glad I tempted you to check that, because I really wanted to know ... Quote Adam Bishop, "who are we to argue with modern historians ...?" When we write or edit articles like this, we /are/ modern historians, I guess. I suppose I feel that encyclopedia articles ought to have a smaller proportion of speculation than historical monographs (or films); and I had the feeling that Guy's putative arrival some years before his marriage was speculation, against the evidence, which seems to be all in favour of his being a recent arrival. But, yes, who knows? Andrew Dalby http://perso.wanadoo.fr/dalby/ 15:16, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
I think the speed with which the marriage was brought on suggests he was already around, and didn't have to be shipped in from France. Baldwin IV seems to have been quick off the mark to marry Sibylla off to him to counter Raymond, Bohemond and the Ibelins. (I think Hamilton's analysis in The Leper King & his Heirs, comparing William of Tyre and the Old French Continuation, is sound.) I think, also, he simply wasn't important enough beforehand to crop up in major documentation.
Ibn al-Athir's "recent" doesn't give a clear time-frame: it could mean anything up to a couple of years! In conclusion, I'd say he arrived after Amalric had established himself, but didn't have to be sent for especially in 1180. Silverwhistle 19:08, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
Rohricht has him at the top of a witness list from March 26, 1173, at Acre, on a charter of Amalric I giving some land (etc) to some Germans. It's number 496, on page 130-31 in volume 1. It's signed by "Guy, count of Jaffa and Ascalon", Reginald of Sidon, the Ibelin brothers, William of Tyre, and various others, but most notably Miles of Plancy, who was dead in 1174. Rohricht's note for Guy says "Guy, who eventually became count of Jaffa and Ascalon through a marriage contracted with Sibylla in Easter, 1180, because of which this charter seemed to be spurious to Strehlke [a previous editor], but he errors, along with William of Tyre, saying that Miles of Plancy, who is a witness to a charter of the king in April 1174, was already dead in October 1173." (The Latin, if you would like to take a better stab at it than me, is "Qui demum 1180 per nuptias infra paschalia cum Sibylla contractas comes Joppensis et Ascalonitanus factus est, qua de causa privelegium nostrum jam Strehlkio spurium esse videbatur, sed idem errat cum Guill. de Tyro dicens, Milonem de Planci Octob. 1173 jam mortuum esse, qui April. 1174 chartae regis testis est.") This is pretty strange! Sibylla hadn't even married William yet...Guy appears again, as Count of Jaffa and Ascalon, in 1177 (no. 548), but this seems to be similar to no. 496, and both zombie Amalric I and zombie Miles of Plancy are on it too (and Strehlke and Rohricht both agree that it is spurious, heh). Both Guy (as Count of Jaffa) and his brother (as constable) are on a charter of 1181 (no. 601), and Guy appears more frequently after that, with Sibylla finally in March 1183 (no. 626). Then nothing, presumably because he was out of favour, until March of 1186 when he and Sibylla appear as king and queen (no. 650). There are some after that where he still claims to be king of Jerusalem, and some where he is king of Cyprus. So what's going on in that 1173 charter? Adam Bishop 20:59, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
Yup, I spotted 548 (my photocopies run pp. 142-47, then 164-91, and Additions pp. 32-47, so I don't have no. 496), but felt it was too doubtful to mention. One of the problematic aspects of Rohricht is that most of the charters listed are not the actual charters, but citations of them in other documents. It is possible, re: 496, that someone after 1180, quoting a charter witnessed by Guy back in the 1170s, may have referred to him by his present-day title. But there's a real problem of religious houses and merchant bodies claiming privileges based on false charter claims. Silverwhistle 21:25, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
Ah, I didn't know that's what Rohricht was doing. Has anyone ever attempted to do a better job with all these crusade charters? Have I stumbled across a possible thesis topic? :) Adam Bishop 21:42, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
No, it's just that due to the exigencies of history, very few original Outremer charters survive (just as we only have one letter by Baldwin IV surviving in a later copy, when he must have written or dictated lots, and none of the surviving texts of the Old French Continuation is earlier than about mid-13C), so we only know about a lot of them where they've been copied down or mentioned elsewhere. Silverwhistle 00:18, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
If I have it right, then, the two charters that Guy apparently signed before 1180 have him as count of Jaffa and Ascalon, which we are certain he wasn't; therefore they have been adjusted (or forged outright) after 1180, and in either case cannot serve, unsupported, as evidence of his presence. The two narrative sources that mention his arrival (one late and romanticized, the other from outside the kingdom) say (1) that Amalric went and fetched him for this 1180 marriage, (2) that he was a recent arrival -- but, yes, what is recent? --, (1+2) that Sibylla wanted him. And the one thing we do know about his relations with Sibylla is that, whenever she did first take to him, she stuck with him against all opposition afterwards. Now, if we assume that he was present in Jerusalem in good time, I suppose we also assume that he was overlooked when Baldwin sent his one surviving letter to Louis VII, asking for a chap to come and marry Sibylla; and that he was overlooked throughout the period when Hugh of Burgundy was expected to answer the call. So he was very easy to overlook. And yet we argue that he was important enough, as a vassal of the Plantagenets, to be a good dynastic choice. Do I have it right? If so, Guy performed a remarkable silent balancing act in the 1170s. Andrew Dalby http://perso.wanadoo.fr/dalby/ 18:56, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
"If I have it right, then, the two charters that Guy apparently signed before 1180 have him as count of Jaffa and Ascalon, which we are certain he wasn't; therefore they have been adjusted (or forged outright) after 1180" - Quotes from/copies of charters are not necessarily forgeries - if a chronicler is citing an earlier document, they may well refer to a signatory by his present-day title. Plus, bear in mind a lot of documentation has probably been lost.
"So he was very easy to overlook. And yet we argue that he was important enough, as a vassal of the Plantagenets, to be a good dynastic choice. Do I have it right?" - In an emergency, he was: the Hugh of Burgundy plan had stalled; Raymond and Bohemond were attempting a coup to force a local candidate from their grouping on to Sibylla. Guy - who had a useful Angevin link, and whose brother seems to have been well-regarded - was handy to seize upon in such an emergency.Silverwhistle 15:26, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
Thanks, Silverwhistle! Just wanting to think it through, really ... Andrew Dalby http://perso.wanadoo.fr/dalby/ 20:10, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
I have this comic vision of him walking along a palace corridor and the king hooking him around the neck with his walking-stick (like a shepherd hooking a sheep with his crook) and dragging him into a side-room: "Get in here! You're marrying my sister!" -"What, right now?" - "Yes! You're single, aren't you? Otherwise, she's going to end up with your big brother's father-in-law!" Silverwhistle 07:21, 28 March 2006 (UTC)
Philip, Count of Flanders also tried to have Sibylla married to one of his own men, but apparently everyone else was opposed to that. (And Philip himself was Sibylla's cousin.) Adam Bishop 21:21, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
Yes - it would have been a disparagement for her to marry a vassal of Philip. (As was marrying Guy, but that was an emergency - ditto marrying Baldwin of Ibelin, for that matter.) Phil's Mum was one of Amaury I's half-sisters. Silverwhistle 07:21, 28 March 2006 (UTC)
I added a few words to clarify the "already" in "must have been already in the kingdom". Take them out again if I have misunderstood something. In the following sentence, "it was vital for Sibylla to marry someone who could rally external help to the kingdom" would no doubt have been a good reason. Is there any evidence that he could? Andrew Dalby 15:32, 13 August 2006 (UTC)
Undoubtedly, the preference for that reason would have been for her to marry another prominent prince from abroad (as per the Hugh of Burgundy plan), but with Raymond and Bohemond threatening to bring troops into the kingdom, a handy Angevin vassal was the nearest best thing. As Hamilton points out, the situation in France was not favourable at this time, and cousin Henry owed the Pope over Becket. Silverwhistle 21:20, 13 August 2006 (UTC)