Foulques de Villaret ( Occitan: Folco del Vilaret, Catalan: Folc del Vilaret; died 1 September 1327), a native of

Languedoc-Roussillon Languedoc-Roussillon (; oc, Lengadòc-Rosselhon ; ca, Llenguadoc-Rosselló) is a former administrative region of France. On 1 January 2016, it joined with the region of Midi-Pyrénées to become Occitania. It comprised five departments, and b ...

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...

, was the 25th Grand Master of the

Knights Hospitaller The Order of Knights of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem ( la, Ordo Fratrum Hospitalis Sancti Ioannis Hierosolymitani), commonly known as the Knights Hospitaller (), was a medieval and early modern Catholic military order. It was headq ...

, succeeding his paternal uncle

Guillaume de Villaret Guillaume de Villaret (c. 1235 – 1305), was the twenty-fourth Grand Master of the Knights Hospitaller, a position he held from 1296 until 1305, succeeding Odon de Pins. He was succeeded by his nephew, Foulques de Villaret, whose career he had d ...

in 1305. His uncle had done much to foster his early career in the Order. He was appointed Admiral in 1299, and Grand Commander two years later. By 1303 he was Lieutenant of the Master, and so advanced to Master on his uncle's death. Under his leadership they launched a successful attempt at the conquest of

Rhodes Rhodes (; el, Ρόδος , translit=Ródos ) is the largest and the historical capital of the Dodecanese islands of Greece. Administratively, the island forms a separate municipality within the Rhodes regional unit, which is part of the S ...

, in the years 1308 and 1309. Other islands were also taken, including Kastellórizo and

Bodrum Bodrum () is a port city in Muğla Province, southwestern Turkey, at the entrance to the Gulf of Gökova. Its population was 35,795 at the 2012 census, with a total of 136,317 inhabitants residing within the district's borders. Known in ancient ...

. The Hospitallers then moved their headquarters to Rhodes. However, despite the huge benefits to his Order from the suppression of the Knights Templar (the Templars' assets were assigned to the Hospitallers by the Pope in 1312), Villaret's campaigns of territorial expansion ran the Order heavily into debt, and these debts were not paid off until the mid-1330s. Villaret seems to have been a difficult and overbearing man, and eventually alienated his Order. Allegations were made of increasingly arrogant, even tyrannical, behaviour, although none of the allegations are specific, and one Italian account of the lives of the Grand Masters claimed that he was treated unjustly. In 1317, the Order attempted a coup against Villaret. A group of knights went to assassinate him at his residence at Rhodini, but his chamberlain aided his escape. He fled to the Hospitaller castle at Lindos, where he was besieged by his own Order. They had, in the meantime, elected Maurice de Pagnac as Grand Master in his place, and wrote to Pope John XXII in July to justify their actions. The Pope summoned both Grand Masters to his court at Avignon to settle the dispute. Meanwhile, Brother Giraud de Pins administered the Order in the Pope's name. The Pope reappointed Villaret – but only so that he could tender his resignation formally. Brother

Hélion de Villeneuve Hélion de Villeneuve Hélion de Villeneuve (c. 1270 – 1346) was a French-born Grand Master of the Knights of St. John. He was the brother of Saint Roseline. He died on the island of Rhodes. The blazon of his coat-of-arms was ''Gules s ...

was named as Master on 18 June 1319, the elderly Pagnac having died in the meantime. The Pope appointed Villaret as Prior of

Capua Capua ( , ) is a city and ''comune'' in the province of Caserta, in the region of Campania, southern Italy, situated north of Naples, on the northeastern edge of the Campanian plain. History Ancient era The name of Capua comes from the Etrus ...

for life on 29 June, but after more problems there, he was transferred to the Priory of

Rome , established_title = Founded , established_date = 753 BC , founder = King Romulus (legendary) , image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg , map_caption ...

in 1325. That, too, seems to have been unsuccessful, and after April that year, he received only a pension. He returned to his homeland and lived as a mere Brother of the Order at his sister's home in Teyran, near Montpellier. He died on 1 September 1327 and was buried in the former Templar Church at Montpellier.

Sources

* Luttrell, Anthony. "Notes on Foulques de Villaret, Master of the Hospital 1305-1319" in ''The Hospitallers of Rhodes and the Mediterranean World'' (Aldershot 1992). {{DEFAULTSORT:Villaret, Foulques de 1327 deaths Knights Hospitaller Grand Masters of the Knights Hospitaller Year of birth unknown Rhodes under the Knights Hospitaller People of Frankish and Latin Greece 14th-century French people