Roger Deslaur

Roger Deslaur (* in the 13th century, † 1320 ) was a Catalan mercenaries and briefly Duke of Athens.

Deslaur came from the Roussillon and came in 1302 as mercenaries of the Catalan Company ( the happy army of the Franks) to Greece. After the Duke of Athens, Walter of Brienne, 1310 had drawn the enmity of the Company to be located Deslaur decided to fight in the pay of the Duke against his former comrades. In the Battle of the Kephissos the company won a crushing victory over the Duke, who was killed. Deslaur was one of the few survivors on the side of the Duke.

The Catalan mercenaries were thereby the new rulers of the Duchy of Athens. However, due to their own republican constitution they had no outstanding leader person who rule over the country would now be able to exercise. They therefore sought among their prisoners for a new leader. After the Knights Bonifacio da Verona had refused the mercenaries wore her former comrades Deslaur the guide to which they eventually accepted. Thus he was the loser of the Kephissos as captain of Company and Duke of Athens. In the subsequent distribution of the conquered country, the rich widow of the fallen during Kephissos Thomas III was. de Stromoncourt married to Deslaur, the order was given dominion over Salona as its own fiefdom.

The new Catalan government in Athens was surrounded by enemies, in the west and north of the Greek Epirus and Thessaly despotisms, in the east of Venice on Euboea and on the south by the Principality of Achaia, which was dominated by the Angevins of Naples. The old Duke family of Brienne could hold also in Argos and Nauplia, where they maintained their own duchy. Therefore, the Catalans came to the decision that they could survive only under the protection of a powerful ruler. So they turned to King Frederick II of Sicily from the house of Aragon, who had once founded the company in the fight against nemesis Anjou. The company developed a special new constitution for the Duchy, which provided for a separation of powers between the autonomous lasting company and the ducal violence. So should remain the prerogative of the company all the military and civilian agencies ( Marshal and Chancellor ), the Duke was only granted the right of appointment. But the Duke retained all sovereign rights, such as the jurisdiction, administration, the Treasury and the decision on war and peace. The Frankish feudal based Assizes of Romanien ( Assisses de Jerusalem) were replaced by the Civil Constitution of Catalonia.

In 1312 this constitution was summoned by messengers of the Company and the King of Sicily and thus legally valid. The king became the new suzerain of the Duchy and appointed his infant son, Prince Manfred, the new Duke. Berenguer Estanyol was sent as curate to Athens, where he took on behalf of the Duke the government. Deslaur then submitted his offices and retired to Salona. He probably died around 1320, since this year the vicar Fadrique Alfonso de Aragón was called in the possession of Salona for the first time.