Battle of Chios (1319)

Battle of Chios
Part of the Latin campaigns against Turkish pirates
Date 23 July 1319 Location off Chios Result Hospitaller victory
Belligerents
Order of Saint John Lordship of Chios	Aydinids
Commanders and leaders
Albert of Schwarzburg	Mehmed Beg
Strength
31 ships	10 galleys 18 other ships
Casualties and losses
Unknown	22 ships sunk or captured

The Battle of Chios was a naval battle fought off the shore of the eastern Aegean island of Chios between a Latin Christian—mainly Hospitaller—fleet and a Turkish fleet from the Aydinid emirate.

The collapse of Byzantine power in western Anatolia and the Aegean Sea in the late 13th century, as well as the disbandment of the Byzantine navy in 1284, created a power vacuum in the region, which was swiftly exploited by the Turkish beyliks and the ghazi raiders. Utilizing local Greek seamen, the Turks began to engage in piracy across the Aegean, targeting especially the numerous Latin island possessions. Turkish corsair activities were aided by the feuds between the two major Latin maritime states, Venice and Genoa. In 1304, the Turks of Menteshe (and later the Aydinids) captured the port town of Ephesus, and the islands of the eastern Aegean seemed about to fall to Turkish raiders. To forestall such a calamitous event, in the same year the Genoese occupied Chios, where Benedetto I Zaccaria established a minor principality, while in ca. 1308 the Knights Hospitaller occupied Rhodes. These two powers would bear the brunt of countering Turkish pirate raids until 1329.

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