The Battle of Nicotera was a 13th century naval engagement, fought between an Aragonese–Sicilian fleet and the Angevin Kingdom of Naples during the War of the Sicilian Vespers. Fought along the coastline of Southern Italy, most notably off of the town of Nicotera, the battle resulted in an Aragonese-Sicilian victory.
The battle was took placing the aftermath of several failed attempts by the Angevin to besiege the Sicilian city of Messina. The siege attritted the strength of the Angevin fleet operating off of Sicily, and the collapse of the siege forced the Angevins to put the fleet into port for repairs. When the fleet subsequently dispersed to its home ports for the winter, it was intercepted and defeated in detail by the Aragonese-Sicilian fleet.
Background
editIn the spring of 1282, the island of Sicily rebelled against the rule of the Charles I of Anjou, king of the Angevin Kingdom of Naples, who had controlled the island since 1266. Starting in Palermo, the rebellion spread across Sicily, resulting in a major threat to Angevin rule over Sicily. Eager to crush the revolt, in June Charles amassed an army of 31,000 men in Catona, planning on making a crossing of the straits of Messina. The Angevin army made a successful crossing of the strait in early July and began a protracted siege of Messina. Supporting the siege was a large Angevin fleet made up of ships levied from Charles' lands in Southern France, Italy, and Greece. These ships were supplemented by mercenary ships from the the Italian city-states of Genoa, Pisa, and Venice.
While Charles and the Angevin army laid siege to Messina, the Sicilian rebels maneuvered politically; a Sicilian parliament was convened to represent the individual Sicilian cities, while envoys were sent to various foreign leaders and the papacy. The parliament came to the conclusion that Sicily lacked the resources to fight Angevin Naples by itself, and so sought out a foreign protector against the Angevins. In June, the Sicilian parliament contacted Peter II of Aragon, who had a claim to the now-vacant throne of Sicily by way of his wife, Constance of Sicily. Peter accepted the Sicilian offer, arriving in Sicily in late August an army. A relief force of Aragonese and Sicilian soldiers was dispatched to Messina, where it reinforced the city against the Angevin siege. Peter's intervention in the Sicilian conflict also brought Aragon's powerful navy into Sicilian waters, where it posed a serious threat to the Angevin fleet operating in support of the siege of Messina.
Facing stiff Sicilian resistance and the new Aragonese threat, Charles of Anjou chose to lift the siege of Messina in mid-September, wary of being cut off from his power base in Calabria by the newly-arrived Aragonese navy. Charles conducted a costly Angevin withdraw back across the strait of Messina in September 1282, and by October no Angevin forces remained on Sicily. However, the evacuation took a toll on the Angevin navy; numerous small watercraft had been lost during the siege of Messina, and many of the Angevin ships needed to be repaired after months of military use. To allow these ships to be repaired, the Charles ordered the fleet to take refuge in the port town of Reggio, where it was safe from attack.