Karl Thopia

Karl Thopia (Albanian: Karl Topia; c. 1339 – January 1388) sometimes written as Charles Thopia, was an Albanian feudal prince and warlord who ruled Albanian domains from 1358 until the first Ottoman conquest of Albania in 1388. Thopia usually maintained good relations with the Roman Curia.^{[failed verification]}

The first mention of the Thopia is from 1329, when Tanusio Thopia was mentioned as one of the counts of Albania. In 1338, Tanusio was mentioned as Count of Mat (conte di Matia). According to Karl Hopf, Tanusio's son or brother Andrea I, as told by Gjon Muzaka (fl. 1510), had fallen in love with an illegitimate daughter of King Robert of Naples when her ship, en route to the Principality of the Morea to be wed with the bailli, had stopped at Durrës where they met. Andrea abducted and married her, and they had two sons, Karl and George. Karl was named after his great great grandfather Charles I of Anjou. King Robert, enraged, under the pretext of reconciliation had the couple invited to Naples where he had them executed. Karl Thopia is first mentioned in 1350, at a time when Anjou still owned Durrës.

The long protracted turmoil of dynastic wars had made germinate in their real victims, the Albanians, the seeds of national sentiment which contained great promise, so that, when after Emperor Stefan Dušan's death, a descendant of Stefan Uroš I, returned to the province, the inhabitants rose en masse and, under the leadership of Karl Thopia, cut down the pretender and his entire force in the battle of Acheloos.

In 1358, Karl rose against the rule of the Anjou and managed to drive them out of Durrës from Epirus and Albania. He ruled most of modern central Albania from 1358 to 1388 and held the title of Princeps Albaniae (Prince of Albania) and Duke of Durrës.

Since 1362, Karl sought Durrës, which was in the possession of Duchess Joanna. The first, certainly still unsuccessful siege lasted from April 1362 to May 1363. Then, Thopia had to withdraw his troops, who were weakened by an epidemic disease. Only in 1367 could Karl conquer Durrës, who had attained in the meantime the tacit agreement of the Venetians for his project and turn this important port into his residence.

Karl gained control of Durrës in 1368, which was where the Angevins held out due to their Kingdom becoming smaller in size. In 1374, Pope Gregory XI awarded him the title "Grande Conte d'Albania" (Grand Count of Albania). Karl lost Durrës in 1376, conquered by Joanna's husband Louis during the Durrës Expedition, but recovered it in 1383 when the last mercenaries of the Navarrese Company moved to Greece.

Thopia ruled over the regions of Durrës, Kruja, Peqin, Elbasan, Mokra and Gora, that is, along both sides of the Via Egnatia as far east as Lake Ohrid.

Balsha II and the Thopia had been fighting for the control of the region between Lake Skadar and Durrës since 1363. Balsha, allied with the Albanian tribe Mataruge, tried to invade Albania in 1364. In the summer of the same year, Balsha was defeated by Karl and Gjergj I Balsha was captured in a skirmish. It would not be until 1366 that Republic of Ragusa would mediate peace between them and procured the release of Balsha II. In 1380, Karl Thopia tried to make an alliance with King Louis I of Hungary, who confirmed it in the possessions he had in Durrës and the surrounding area. This alliance was not welcomed by either the Venetians or the Roman Curia, as long as the Hungarian king supported Avignon's antipope. Rejecting Charles's legitimacy over Durrës, the Pope turned his brother-in-law Balsha II against him.