Robert | |
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King Robert from the Bible of Naples
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King of Naples | |
Reign | 5 May 1309-20 January 1343 |
Predecessor | Charles II |
Successor | Joanna I |
Born | 1277 |
Died | 20 January 1343 (aged c. 65) Kingdom of Naples |
Spouse |
Yolanda of Aragon Sancha of Majorca |
Issue More |
Charles, Duke of Calabria Charles d'Artois |
House | House of Anjou-Naples |
Father | Charles II of Naples |
Mother | Maria of Hungary |
Robert of Anjou (Italian: Roberto d'Angiò), known as Robert the Wise (Italian: Roberto il Saggio; 1277 – 20 January 1343), was King of Naples, titular King of Jerusalem and Count of Provence and Forcalquier from 1309 to 1343, the central figure of Italian politics of his time. He was the third son of King Charles II of Naples and Maria of Hungary, and during his father's lifetime he was styled Duke of Calabria (1296–1309).
During the Sicilian Vespers (1282), the child Robert was the hostage of Peter III of Aragon. After the death of his elder brother, Charles Martel of Anjou, he became heir to the crown of Naples; to obtain the crown of neighbouring Sicily, he married King James of Sicily's sister Yolanda, in exchange for James's renouncing of Sicily. However, the Sicilian barons refused him and elected James' brother, Frederick II. The war continued, and with the Peace of Caltabellotta (1302) Robert and the Angevin dynasty lost Sicily forever, their rule limited to the south of peninsular Italy.
Robert inherited the position of papal champion in Italy; his reign being blessed from the papal enclave within Robert's Provence, by the French Pope Clement V, who made him papal vicar in Romagna and Tuscany, where Robert intervened in the war of factions in Florence, accepted the offered signiory of that city, but had to abandon it due to Clement's opposition.