1229
Frederick II crowns himself in Jerusalem
Under a treaty with al-Kamil, the emperor entered Jerusalem and placed a crown on his own head in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. No bishop would officiate for an excommunicate. Christian pilgrims regained the holy city without a swordstroke. The papacy fumed. The spectacle of an excommunicated emperor crowning himself in the holiest church in Christendom scandalized popes and delighted cynics for a generation.
Treaty of Meaux ends the Albigensian Crusade
Raymond VII of Toulouse knelt at Notre-Dame and surrendered his cities, castles, and independence to the French crown. The vibrant Occitan world of courtly love and Cathar preaching was broken. An Inquisition followed to finish what the armies had begun. The treaty required Raymond to endow a university in Toulouse for the express purpose of training preachers to root out heresy among his own subjects.
Hafsid dynasty founded in Tunis
Abu Zakariya Yahya declared independence from the collapsing Almohad caliphate and established the Hafsid dynasty in Ifriqiya. Tunis grew into a cosmopolitan Mediterranean capital, its harbors crowded with Venetian, Genoese, and Catalan merchant ships trading grain, wool, and coral. The Hafsids would rule North Africa for over three centuries, outlasting every other Almohad successor state.
James I of Aragon lands on Mallorca
The Aragonese king launched a naval crusade against the Muslim taifa of Mallorca. His knights stormed the island in a brief, violent campaign. The conquest added the Balearics to the Aragonese crown and gave Catalan maritime commerce a new base in the western Mediterranean. Catalan settlers and their language soon dominated the islands, displacing the Arabic-speaking Muslim population through conversion and emigration.