Foulques de Villaret

Fra ' Fulk de Villaret (also Fulk of Villaret, Folquetus Villaretus, Fulco de Villa Reto ) ( † September 1, 1327 ) was a nobleman from Provence and from 1305 to 1319 the 25th Grand Master of the Knights Hospitaller.

He replaced his brother Guillaume de Villaret in 1305 as Grand Master from, who had tried in vain to take Rhodes.

Fulk conquered Rhodes in 1309 and established the Order there for over 200 years.

In Cyprus, the Order possessed a subject of the king there is no freedom of action. In 1306 the opportunity arose to found a new religious seat. Fulk de Villaret entered into negotiations with the Genoese pirate Vignolo de ' Vignoli, who had on the Greek Dodecanese Islands fief. It was agreed that de ' Vignoli keep after the conquest of Rhodes third of the island, while the Order should take the rest of the island, and the island of Leros and a third of the island of Kos in possession. After Fulk de Villaret had also received support from Philip the Fair of France, the King of England, Edward II, the Pope, Clement V, Charles II of Naples and by the Genoese, he landed on Rhodes and captured two of the strategic important strongholds of the island: Feraklos and Filerimos. The final conquest of the island took place in 1309 with the capture of the city of Rhodes. Up to three ( Karpathos and Kassos in the possession of the Venetian Cornaro family; Astypalia, dominated by the Quirini from Duchy of Naxos ) and the other islands of the Dodecanese were conquered one by one.

The adaptation to the local Greek population was difficult.

The Ottoman Empire, which saw threatened by a military order of knights in such close proximity to at hand. However, the Turks could not conquer the island at that time.

Fulk de Villarets Lasterhaftigkeiten and his despotism brought the members of the Order as against him that the Knights rebelled. They appointed Maurice de Pagnac the new Grand Master. Fulk de Villaret was able to evade capture by fleeing into the fortress of Lindos. The intervention of the Pope continued the dispute to an end. Both grandmasters were removed from office in 1319 and Helion de Villeneuve transfer leadership.

From January 1325 to April 1326 Fulk de Villaret was briefly the Grand Prior of the Grand Priory of Rome of the Order.