Lucia, Countess of Tripoli

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Lucia of Tripoli was the last Countess of Tripoli, a Crusader state in the Levant. She was the daughter of Bohemond VI of Antioch and Sibylla of Armenia, and her brother was Bohemund VII.

When Bohemond VII died in 1287, their mother made Bertrand of Gibelet the regent. He was very unpopular with Tripoli’s people, who set up their own city administration. In 1288 Lucia came to Tripoli from Apulia, Italy to take control of the county. She faced opposition from both the city’s commune and from Genoa because of her marriage to Narjot de Toucy around 1275–1278 in Auxerre.

Genoa’s Benedetto I Zaccaria tried to install a podestà, a Genoese official, which would have made Tripoli a Genoese colony. The commune eventually agreed to recognize Lucia, but she unexpectedly allied herself with Genoa. The Venetians and Pisans, who did business with Tripoli, were shocked and supposedly joined with the Mamluk sultan Qalawun to attack.

Lucia then allied with the Mongols, who asked Europe for help, but no aid arrived. Qalawun began the Siege of Tripoli in 1289 and captured the city on April 26. Two years later Acre, the last Crusader outpost in the Holy Land, also fell to the Mamluks.

Narjot de Toucy, Lucia’s husband, never came to Tripoli because he stayed in Naples on business and died there in 1292. The date of Lucia’s death is unknown, but she died after 1292, probably around 1299.

Lucia and Narjot had one son, Philippe II de Toucy, who inherited the lordship of Laterza on Narjot’s death and the claim to Antioch on Lucia’s death.