Silver Crusader Gros of Bohemond VI

The Crusades were a series of eight military campaigns organised by Christian kings and religious leaders in order to retake Jerusalem and the Holy Land from Muslim control. They took place over a period of almost 200 hundred years from 1096, with the last remaining Christian territory falling into Islamic hands in 1291. These Silver Gros were the last of their type issued in the region before it finally fell under complete Muslim control in 1291. Bohemond VI ‘The Fair’ had succeeded his father, Bohemond V, at the tender age of 15 when his father died in 1252. His reign was marked by continuous conflicts with the Muslim states surrounding his territories and he lost power, but not his life, in 1271 when the Mamluk Sultan Baibars laid siege to Tripoli. He died in 1275 leaving a son, Bohemond VII, and three daughters. They were the last true rulers of the Crusader States in the region and their coins are much sought after. This coin is the Gros of Bohemond VI.