Martino Zaccaria Martino Zaccaria was the Lord of Chios from 1314 to 1329 , ruler of several other Aegean islands , and baron of Veligosti – Damala and Chalandritsa in the Principality of Achaea . He distinguished himself in the fight against Turkish corsairs in the Aegean Sea , and received the title of " King and Despot of Asia Minor " from the titular Latin Emperor , Philip II . He was deposed from his rule of Chios by a Byzantine expedition in 1329 , and imprisoned in Constantinople until 1337 . Martino then returned to Italy , where he was named the Genoese ambassador to the Holy See . In 1343 he was named commander of the Papal squadron in the Smyrniote crusade against Umur Bey , ruler of the Emirate of Aydin , and participated in the storming of Smyrna in October 1344 . He was killed , along with several other of the crusade ' s leaders , in a Turkish attack on 17 January 1345 . Life . Lord of Chios and wars against the Turks . Martino Zaccaria was a scion of the Genoese Zaccaria family . Through his father , Nicolino Zaccaria , he was a nephew to Benedetto I Zaccaria , lord of Chios and of Phocaea on the Anatolian coast . Benedetto I had captured Chios from the Byzantine Empire in 1304 , citing the island ' s vulnerability to Turkish raids . His occupation was acknowledged by the impotent Byzantine emperor , Andronikos II Palaiologos , initially for a period of 10 years , but which was then renewed at five - year intervals . Benedetto died in 1307 and was succeeded in Chios by his son , Paleologo Zaccaria . When he died childless in 1314 , the island passed to Martino and his brother , Benedetto II . Chios was a small but wealthy domain , with an annual income of 120 , 000 gold " hyperpyra " . Over the next few years , Martino made it the core of a small realm encompassing several islands off the shore of Asia Minor , including Samos and Kos . As lord of Chios , Martino and Benedetto fought with distinction against the Turkish pirates , who made their appearance in the Aegean in the early years of the 14th century . In 1304 , the capture of Ephesus by the emirate of Menteshe had sparked the Genoese occupation of Chios , and raids against the Aegean islands intensified over the next years . The Emirate of Aydin soon emerged as the chief Turkish maritime emirate , especially under the leadership of Umur Bey , while the Zaccaria , along with the Knights Hospitaller of Rhodes , became the two main Latin antagonists of the Turkish pirates . The Zaccaria are reported to have maintained a thousand infantry , a hundred horseman and a couple of galley s on constant alert . In 1317 , they lost the citadel of Smyrna on the Anatolian coast to the Aydinids , but continued to hold on to the lower city until 1329 , when Umur Bey captured it . In 1319 , however , Martino Zaccaria participated with seven ships in a Hospitaller fleet that scored a crushing victory over an Aydinid fleet from Ephesus . By the end of his rule on Chios , Martino is said to have taken captive or slain more than 10 , 000 Turks , and received an annual tribute in order not to attack them . His constant efforts against the Turkish pirates earned him great praise by contemporary Latin writers , who wrote that if not for his vigilance , " neither man , nor woman , nor dog , nor cat , nor any live animal could have remained in any of the neighbouring islands " . Martino also intervened to stop the slave trade carried out by the Genoese of Alexandria , for which he was praised by Pope John XXII , who in exchange granted him the right to export mastic to Egypt , and proposed that the Zaccaria be given command of the Latin fleets in the Aegean . Martino ' s prestige rose further when he also became one of the most important feudatories in the Principality of Achaea . Shortly after 1316 , he bought the rights to the Barony of Chalandritsa from Aimon of Rans , although in a document of 1324 it appears that he possessed only half of it , the other being held by Peter dalle Carceri . Martino added to his domains when he married Jacqueline de la Roche , related to the De la Roche dukes of Athens and heiress of the Barony of Veligosti – Damala . Martino ' s elevated standing was now recognized by Philip II , titular Latin emperor of Constantinople , who in 1325 named him " King and Despot of Asia Minor " and gave him as fiefs the islands of Chios , Samos , Kos , and Lesbos — which formed part of the Latin emperors ' personal domain by the Treaty of Viterbo — as well as Ikaria , Tenedos , Oinousses and Marmara Island . This award was mostly symbolic , as except for the first three , which the Zaccaria already controlled , the others were in the hands of the Byzantines or the Turks . In exchange , Martino promised to aid with 500 horsemen in Philip ' s hoped - for , but never to be realized , expedition to recover Constantinople from the Byzantines . Byzantine recovery of Chios . If these ties to the Latin Emperor provoked displeasure at the Byzantine court , for the time being relations remained good : the lease of Chios was renewed in 1324 , and in 1327 Martino took part in alliance negotiations between the Byzantines and the Republic of Venice . At the same time , however , Martino ' s behaviour became increasingly assertive : ca . 1325 he ousted his brother as co - ruler of Chios and began minting coins in his own name . In 1328 , the rise of a new and energetic emperor , Andronikos III Palaiologos , to the Byzantine throne , marked a turning - point in relations . One of the leading Chian nobles , Leo Kalothetos , went to meet the new emperor and his chief minister , John Kantakouzenos , to propose a reconquest of the island . Andronikos III readily agreed . On the pretext of Martino ' s unauthorized building of a new fortress on the island , the emperor sent him a letter where he rodered him to cease construction , and to present himself in Constantinople in the next year in order to renew the island ' s lease . Martino haughtily rejected the demands and accelerated construction , but now his deposed brother Benedetto lodged a complaint with the emperor claiming the one - half share of the island ' s revenues that was his due . With these events as an excuse , in autumn 1329 Andronikos III assembled a fleet of 105 vessels — including the forces of the Latin Duke of Naxos , Nicholas I Sanudo — and sailed to Chios . Even after the imperial fleet reached the island , Andronikos III offered to let Martino keep his possessions in exchange for the installation of a Byzantine garrison and the payment of an annual tribute , but Martino refused . He sank his three galleys in the harbour , forbade the Greek population to bear arms and locked himself with 800 men in his citadel , where he raised his own banner instead of the emperor ' s . His will to resist was broken , however , when Benedetto surrendered his own fort to the Byzantines , and when he saw the locals welcoming them , he was soon forced to surrender . The emperor spared his life , even though the Chians demanded his execution , and took him prisoner to Constantinople . Martino ' s wife and relatives were allowed to go free with their movable wealth , while most of the Zaccaria adherents chose to stay on the island as imperial officials . Benedetto was offered the island ' s governorship , but he obstinately demanded to receive it as a personal possession in the same way as his brother had held it , a concession the emperor was unwilling to grant . Benedetto retired to the Genoese colony of Galata , from where a few years later he made an unsuccessful attempt to reclaim Chios ; he died soon after . Andronikos III appointed Kalothetos as the new governor of Chios , and followed up his success by sailing to Phocaea , forcing it to acknowledge his suzerainty . Later life and the Smyrniote crusade . Martino was released in 1337 at the intercession of the Pope and Philip VI of France , and was offered a military command and some castles by the emperor as compensation . He then returned to his hometown , Genoa , and was named the city ' s ambassador to the Holy See . In September 1343 , he was appointed to command the four papal galleys in the crusade against Umur Bey , under the overall command of the titular Latin Patriarch of Constantinople , Henry of Asti . In view of Zaccaria ' s character , the Pope expressly warned Henry of Asti not to allow him to divert the crusade in a bid to recover Chios , and authorized Henry to replace Zaccaria if he deemed it necessary . The crusade scored a swift and unexpected success : Umur Bey was caught off guard , and the crusaders recaptured the lower town of Smyrna on 28 October 1344 . The citadel remained in Turkish hands , however , and the crusaders ' position remained precarious . With Venetian aid , they fortified the lower town to enable them to resist Umur ' s counterattack . The emir bombarded the lower town with mangonel s , but the crusaders managed to sortie and destroy them , effectively breaking the siege . To celebrate this feat , Henry of Asti decided , against the advice of the other crusader leaders , to hold mass in the city ' s former cathedral , which lay in the no - man ' s - land between the citadel and the crusader - held lower town . The Turks attacked during the service , on 17 January 1345 , and killed Zaccaria , Henry of Asti and other crusader leaders present . Family . Martino Zaccaria married , probably some time before 1325 , Jacqueline de la Roche . An earlier conjecture of Karl Hopf about a first marriage to a daughter of George I Ghisi , heir to the lordship of Tinos and Mykonos , has since been discarded . From his marriage , Martino had two sons :