Siege of Messina
1282 CE.
Shown on the map at 38.183°, 15.550°.
The siege of Messina (June–September 1282) was a 13th-century military engagement. Fought during the opening months of the War of the Sicilian Vespers, the engagement began when an Angevin army led by Charles of Anjou laid siege to the city of Messina, which had rebelled against Angevin rule. Hoping to secure Messina as a bridgehead to reconquer the rest of Sicily, Charles of Anjou conducted a successful naval crossing of the Strait of Messina, but several assaults on the city failed. After five weeks of siege, the Messinese defenders were reinforced by an Aragonese relief force. Facing mounting casualties and supply issues, the Angevin army lifted the siege and made a costly withdraw back across the strait to Calabria. The victorious Aragonese–Sicilian forces followed up the siege with a series of military actions to harass the retreating Angevins, and the failure to take Messina was an early defeat for the Angevin Kingdom in the Vesperan war.
Text from the Wikipedia article Siege of Messina (1282), licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.