Battle of Saint George 1320: When the Byzantines Pulled a Perfect Trick on the Latin Crusaders
A minor but delicious episode in the declining years of the Latin Principality of Achaea. False flags, an ambush in Arcadia, and a reminder that the Byzantine Empire was not quite ready for the museum yet.
Ah, 1320. An year that would otherwise slip quietly between the failed Crusades and the first rumblings of the Hundred Years’ War—if it weren’t for a sharp little medieval scuffle in the Peloponnese. The Battle of Saint George (San Giorgio) is one of those under-the-radar episodes that somehow manages to be both obscure and highly entertaining. Picture the scene: Arcadia, the poetic land of shepherds and myths, suddenly turned into a battlefield where a half-Bulgarian Byzantine governor gives the Latin lords of Achaea a masterclass in deception. It is 9 September 1320, and this is less a chivalric duel than a well-timed practical joke with swords.
Background: A Latin Principality in Crisis and an Ambitious Byzantine Governor
To understand how we arrive at that September day, we have to step back into the mess that was the Morea (as the Peloponnese was then called). The Principality of Achaea was a classic product of the Fourth Crusade: after the Latins sacked Constantinople in 1204 and carved up the Byzantine Empire like a cake, French, Italian, and other Western knights took the Morea and turned it into a feudal patchwork of castles, vineyards, olive groves, and heavy taxes on the Greek peasantry.
By the mid-1310s the principality was fraying. Prince Philip I of Taranto died, and a messy succession dispute erupted involving his widow, Matilda of Hainaut, the Angevins of Naples, and various other claimants. The bailli (governor) Frederick Trogisio was left trying to hold the pieces together with armed diplomacy and limited resources.
On the other side, the Byzantines—reduced to a shadow of their former self after 1204—had clawed back a foothold in the Morea centered on Mystras. From 1316 the governor there was Andronikos Asen: nephew of Emperor Andronikos II Palaiologos, half-Bulgarian (his father had been Ivan Asen III of Bulgaria), and a hard-nosed pragmatic commander. While the Latin lords squabbled over inheritances, Asen launched targeted raids and sieges. In 1320 he decided to hit Arcadia, aiming at the castle of Saint George in Skorta—a Latin stronghold built in the 1290s that had already changed hands once before.
The irony was perfect: the Latins were divided and distracted; the Byzantines, though weak at the imperial center, had an energetic local leader who knew how to exploit weakness.
Forces Involved
Exact numbers are lost to the usual medieval fog. Asen commanded a relatively compact force—perhaps a few thousand men: local Greek infantry (the agile stratioti familiar with the rough terrain), archers, and limited heavy cavalry. Motivation was high; many local Greeks preferred Byzantine rule to Latin taxation.
On the Latin side, Frederick Trogisio hastily assembled what he could from the Principality: barons such as Bartholomew II Ghisi (Grand Constable, lord of Tinos and Mykonos), the sword-wielding Bishop James of Olena, and contingents from the Teutonic Knights and the Hospitallers. The force included heavy cavalry, feudal infantry, and possibly some mercenaries. Numbers were probably comparable to the Byzantines, but morale and cohesion were shaky. The Frankish population in the Morea had always been thin.
So here they were: descendants of the crusaders who had taken Constantinople, now defending an outpost against “schismatic” Greeks, while a half-Bulgarian Byzantine governor prepared a trap.
The Battle: A Siege That Became an Ambush
Asen had been besieging Saint George for some time. The Greek castellan, Nicoloucho of Patras, surrendered—whether by negotiation, bribery, or simple realism is unclear (both were common). Then came the clever part: Asen left the Achaean banners flying from the towers, making the castle look as if it were still in Latin hands.
Trogisio’s relief army marched confidently to the rescue, believing they were about to break the siege. Asen’s men waited in the broken, wooded, hilly ground of Skorta. When the Latins approached, the Byzantines struck: arrows, infantry charges, flanking pressure. The Latin force, caught by surprise and unable to deploy properly, collapsed. The Teutonic commander was killed. Ghisi was captured and later taken to Constantinople. Bishop James was taken but quickly released (probably to avoid ecclesiastical complications). Trogisio himself escaped, but the army was routed. Saint George remained in Byzantine hands, and Arcadia began to fall like dominoes.
The image is almost comic: Latin knights seeing “their” banners and thinking the day was saved, only to be hit from the flanks by Greeks who had been waiting for exactly that moment. The fighting was sharp but short—more ambush than set-piece battle.
Strategy and Outcome
Asen’s approach was classic late-Byzantine indirect warfare: use the terrain, take the castle cheaply if possible, deceive the enemy with false signals, and avoid a fair fight. The Latins, by contrast, reacted too slowly and with insufficient reconnaissance. Arrogance and urgency made a poor combination.
Latin losses were significant in men of rank and in morale. Byzantine losses appear to have been light. In the aftermath, other Arcadian castles (Karytaina, Akova, Polyphengos and others) fell or submitted. The Principality of Achaea was pushed back toward the western and northern coasts, losing defensive depth it had held for decades. Some Latin residents in the interior even converted to Orthodoxy and integrated.
The victory strengthened the Byzantine foothold around Mystras and accelerated the long decline of Latin power in the Morea. Attempts at recovery (including an Angevin expedition in the mid-1320s) achieved little lasting success. Venice was even offered the principality in 1321 and declined.
Anecdotes and Curiosities
- The false-banner trick is pure textbook deception—Sun Tzu would have nodded approvingly.
- Bartholomew Ghisi, a major island lord, ended up a prisoner in Constantinople. The image of a Latin baron in the Byzantine capital is quietly satisfying.
- A bishop fighting with a sword and then being politely released says a lot about the tangled religious politics of the period.
- Andronikos Asen, the half-Bulgarian outsider, outperformed the “pure” Frankish aristocracy on their own ground.
- The Teutonic Knights, better known for their later Baltic crusades, left dead in the Greek hills—another small irony of the crusading movement’s long afterlife.
- The ruined castle of Saint George still exists and can be visited by those who like their history with a side of scrub and stone.
Final Thoughts
The Battle of Saint George is a small engagement with outsized symbolic value. It shows a late Byzantine commander using limited resources, local knowledge, and deception to peel away territory from a fractious Latin principality. It is not a grand clash of empires; it is a sharp reminder that the Latin states in Greece were already brittle, and that the Byzantine rump could still, on a good day, outthink them.
In the broader story of the Morea, this was one more step in the slow reconquest that would eventually make Mystras a late flowering of Byzantine culture—before the Ottomans arrived and changed the board entirely. For one September day in 1320, though, the Byzantines got the last laugh with a simple, elegant trick: leave the enemy’s flags flying, and wait.
Sometimes the best victories are the ones that look like someone else’s banners.
FAQ – Battle of Saint George 1320
1. When and where did it take place?
9 September 1320, near the castle of Saint George in Skorta, Arcadia (Peloponnese).
2. Who commanded the Byzantine side?
Andronikos Asen, governor of the Byzantine province in the Morea.
3. What was the key trick used?
After taking the castle, Asen left the Latin (Achaean) banners flying to deceive the approaching relief army.
4. What was the result?
Decisive Byzantine victory. The Latin relief force was routed, Arcadia began to fall, and the Principality of Achaea lost significant territory.
5. Why does this minor battle matter?
It accelerated the decline of Latin power in the Peloponnese and strengthened the Byzantine foothold centered on Mystras.
6. Were the military orders involved?
Yes—contingents of Teutonic Knights and Hospitallers fought on the Latin side; the Teutonic commander was killed.
SOURCES:
The Chronicle of the Morea (French and Aragonese versions) Primary source. It recounts Andronikos Asen’s 1320 campaign, the siege of Saint George Castle, and the false-flag ambush. Antoine Bon – La Morée franque. Recherches historiques, topographiques et archéologiques sur la principauté d’Achaïe (1969) A classic, seminal study on the Principality of Achaea and the Franco-Byzantine wars in the Peloponnese.
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