Balian of ibelin biography of rory gilmore girlfriend

Balian d'Ibelin, the defender of Jerusalem in , had two daughers, Helvis and Margaret. Both helped establish the Ibelin dynasty by strengthening the kinship ties of the House of Ibelin with marriages to leading noblemen in the Kingdoms of Jerusalem and France.

Teodora, a Roman courtesan and former

Both women married twice. When still a young girl, Helvis married Reginald, Lord of Sidon. Sidon had fought his way off the field at Hattin and evaded capture. He defended his castle of Belfort against Saladin, allegedly pretending an interest in converting to Islam to buy time to build up his defences. He was seized when he came to negotiate and either tortured in sight of the castle until he ordered the garrison to surrender or held in captivity in Damascus until the castle surrendered to secure his release.

If so, it was a miscalculation. The restoration of Sidon to Christian rule remained a promise until when the German Crusade recaptured it. In , five years after regaining his barony, Reginal de Sidon died. He was probably close to or more than 70 years of age, and Helvis would have been just She was also the mother of a young son named after her father, Balian.

He also attempted to mediate between the factions. Helvis married a second time. Since Helvis was not an heiress, she could was not required to remarry, and we can assume this second marriage was of her choosing. Her choice was a newcomer to Outremer, a man who had followed the call to the Fourth Crusade but refused to be misused as a Venetian mercenary.

Guy was born in , which made him a good 18 years older than Helvis and already in his early forties when he arrived in the Holy Land.