page_title: Antakya
section_title: Crusader era
hierarchical_section_title: Antakya / History / Crusader era
caption_attribution_description: Capture_of_Antioch_by_Bohemond_of_Tarente_in_June_1098
context_page_description: Antakya is the capital of Hatay Province, the southernmost province of Turkey. The city is located in a well-watered and fertile valley on the Orontes River, about 20 kilometers from the Levantine Sea.
  Today's city stands partly on the site of the ancient Antioch, which was founded in the 4th century BC by the Seleucid. Antioch later became one of the Roman Empire's largest cities, and was made the capital of the provinces of Syria and Coele-Syria. It was also an influential early center of Christianity, and gained much ecclesiastical importance in the Byzantine Empire. Captured by the caliph Umar in the 7th century, the medieval Antakiyah was conquered or re-conquered several times: by the Byzantine in 969, the Seljuk in 1084, the Crusaders in 1098, the Mamluk in 1268, and eventually the Ottoman in 1517, who would integrate it to the Aleppo Eyalet then to the Aleppo Vilayet. The city joined the Hatay State under the French Mandate before joining the Turkish Republic.
  Most of the population, which was approximately 216,960 as of 2012, speaks Turkish as their native language, while a minority are native Arabic speakers.
context_section_description: The Crusaders' Siege of Antioch between October 1097 and June 1098 during the First Crusade resulted in its fall. The Crusaders caused significant damage, including a massacre of its population, both Christian and Muslim. Following the defeat of Seljuk forces arriving with the aim to break the siege only four days after its capture by the crusaders, Bohemond I became its overlord. It remained the capital of the Latin Principality of Antioch for nearly two centuries.
  In 1268 it fell to the Egyptian Mamluk Sultan Baibars after another siege. Baibars proceeded to massacre the Christian population. In addition to suffering the ravages of war, the city lost its commercial importance because trade routes to East Asia moved north following the 13th-century Mongol conquests. Antioch never recovered as a major city, with much of its former role falling to the port city of Alexandretta (İskenderun). An account of both cities as they were in 1675 appears in the diary of the English naval chaplain Henry Teonge.
caption: Capture of Antioch by Louis Gallait
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