Venetians and Genoese sign a peace treaty, but only because King Louis IX of France needs a powerful united fleet for the crusade he is planning. For the Venetians and Genoese, it is actually only a brief truce between bitter enemies.

Japan. The Mongol delegation, including the Minister of War and the Minister of Rites, is sent back without a response by shogun Hojo Tokimune.

Modena. The statue of Bonissima is erected in honor of a lady named Bona, famous in the city for lending money without charging interest during a severe drought.

Venice. The complete form of stable government of the Republic of Venice is as follows: 30 members of the May Council are chosen by lot: the 30 are reduced by lot to 9, the 9 elect 40, the 40 are reduced by lot to 12, the 12 elect 25, the 25 are reduced by lot to 9, the 9 elect 45, the 45 are reduced by lot to 11, the 11 elect 41, and the 41 designate the Doge, who must then be approved by the People’s Assembly.

Giotto Bondone, a pupil of Cimabue

Middle East. Abaqa, son of Khan Hulegu and his successor as leader of the Ilkhanids, attacks Berke, also a grandson of Genghis Khan and leader of the Golden Horde, who awaits him on the Kur River with 300,000 soldiers. Berke is defeated in the terrible clash and, wounded in battle, dies while retreating with his men.

Mongolia. Boge’s sudden death indirectly confirms the troubled confirmation of his brother Qubilai as Khan.

Maraghe, Azerbaijan, capital of the Ilkhanid ulus. Khan Huleghu, son of Tolui and grandson of Genghis Khan, dies. He is buried like his grandfather, with several sacrificed princesses. He is succeeded by his son Abaqa.

Documented transit of a bright comet. Pope Urban IV falls ill the day the comet appears in the sky and dies the exact day it disappears. Coincidence? Yes.

The Genoese admiral Grillo traps the Venetian admiral protecting the caravan headed for Acre. Through subterfuge and carefully spread false rumors, he surprises the Venetians at Durazzo. An entire year of Venetian overseas trade is lost. The Venetians are now willing to make peace, but the Genoese are still smarting from their defeats and prefer to resort to sudden and successful attacks rather than the Venetians’ attempt at absolute dominion of the seas.

Modena. The Campionesi Masters (craftsmen from Campione d’Italia, now in Switzerland) completed the sixth pseudo-tier in 1261 and in the following years added the characteristic octagonal tip to the Ghirlandina.

Ayn Jalut (The Springs of Goliath, present-day Israel). The Qipchaq army, using warfare techniques very similar to those of the Mongols, defeats the Mongols overwhelmingly. They number 120,000 Mamluks against 20,000 Mongols. The Mongol Ketbogha is captured and executed on the battlefield. This is the first Mongol defeat on the battlefield and the final halt in Mongol expansion westward.

Syria. The Mongol Hulegu conquers Aleppo, captures the Ayyubid lord of Aleppo, an-Nasir Yusuf, and takes him with him. He will have him killed a few months later.

Baghdad. The Mongol Hulegu massacres the population of Kermashah during his march toward Baghdad. Baiju, meanwhile, descends from Mosul and then reaches Hulegu on the banks of the Dujayl River, where they clash and defeat the army of Caliph al-Mustafa’sim’bi’llah, opening a dam, flooding the area, and killing 12,000 enemy soldiers.

Foundation of the Order of Augustinian Friars. Organized as an order in 1256, they are the union of many groups of hermits who followed the rule of St. Augustine, who in the 4th century had founded a monastery near Hippo, his hometown.

Lincoln, Northern England. The body of a nine-year-old boy, Hugh, is found at the bottom of a well. Rumors spread through the village that the boy may have been sacrificed by the Jews during one of their dark rites. The story spread by word of mouth, and one of the most influential chroniclers of the time, Matthew Paris, reports that the Jews had convened to kidnap, fatten, torture, and finally crucify the child. Nineteen Jews were tried and executed for this. And a series of vendettas and pogroms would follow for years throughout England. Finally, in 1290, the entire Jewish population was expelled from England. Hugh was buried in Lincoln Cathedral, and miracles were attributed to him in the centuries that followed. Only in 1955, ten years after the Holocaust, did Lincoln Cathedral repudiate the bloody defamation, placing a plaque acknowledging that the story of Jewish responsibility was fabricated and unsupported by any evidence, and that this had cost the lives of many innocent Jews. Some fake news stories last 700 years…

Marco Polo was born in Korcula, Dalmatia, a Venetian protectorate, with the name Marko Pilic.

Middle East. The Genoese are firmly established in Acre and Tyre and in northern Syria (the Crusaders granted them extensive privileges in exchange for their assistance).

Mongolia. Giovanni da Pian del Carpine visits the Mongolian capital of Karakorum.

Construction begins on the Church of San Francesco in Modena. The saint had been dead for only 18 years.

Estonia. The Battle of the Ice Lake, also called the Battle of the Ice, Battle on the Ice (Estonian: Jäälahing; Russian: Ледовое побоище, transliterated: Ledovoje poboišče), fought on Lake Chud, near the present-day border between Russia and Estonia, by troops of the Principality of Novgorod against the Livonian Crusader forces and their allies. The defeat of the Crusaders and Danes by the Novgorod forces led by Prince Alexander Nevsky ended the phase of the Northern Crusades in which Catholic forces had attempted, around 1240, to subjugate the territories inhabited by Orthodox Slavs and pagans east of Estonia, which they had recently conquered for evangelization purposes. Historically, it was a relatively minor feat of arms, but it quickly became a symbol of Russian nationalism, like its protagonist, Prince Nevsky, who was canonized in 1547. Its modern fame is largely due to Sergei Mikhailovich Eisenstein’s film of the same name. Written shortly before the Second World War, the work adheres to the canons of Soviet propaganda: the knights are depicted as cruel German invaders and the Slavic forces as a mass of proletarians fighting for freedom.

Paris. At the culmination of a decade of indictments against the Jews, a public burning of the Talmud was carried out, a work deemed heretical and an instrument of anti-Christian hatred. Two years earlier, Louis IX had ordered the confiscation of copies of the Talmud, and had instructed the Dominicans, who had recently been appointed to run the anti-heretical Inquisition, to do so.

Lower Volga. The Mongol Batu receives a formal act of submission from the Grand Duke of Vladimir, Yaroslav I, beginning a relationship of vassalage that will last for several centuries, until the mid-16th century, when Ivan the Terrible will end it by reconquering the various qanates that arose from the fragmentation of the Mongol Empire.

After the Battle of Liegnitz, the Mongols push further south, storming and sacking the city of Pest. The Mongols will not continue their incredible westward advance: the Great Khan, Ogodey, dies in Mongolia. Batu returns home for the funeral, bringing his army with him. Europe is saved.

Mongolia. Khan Ogodei, son of Genghis Khan and administrator of the Yuan ulus (northern China, Mongolia, Korea, and eastern Siberia), dies.

The Mongol vanguard, chasing after the Hungarian King Bela, reached Croatia, Dalmatia, as far as Split.

Mohi, Hungary. After the victory at Liegnitz (Poland), the Mongol contingent reunites with the bulk of the forces commanded by Batu himself and defeats the Hungarian army at Mohi, in a battle that remains etched in Western memory as the breakthrough. From there, they will reach the Adriatic, and only the death of Ogodei will force them to return home for the funeral and the succession.

Poland. The Mongol army crosses the Vistula and reaches Krakow.

The lord of Ferrara sides with Emperor Frederick II, but the Pope claims the city as his own. Venice comes to the pope’s aid and lays siege to the city (which was on the sea) with its fleet. But more than the siege, the battle is decided by the popular uprising in favor of the Este family. The Este accept a treaty that gives Venice control of Ferrara’s trade with the Adriatic.

Paris. Louis IX orders the confiscation of copies of the Talmud, and appoints the Dominicans, recently appointed to manage the anti-heretical Inquisition, to do so. In 1242, at the culmination of a decade of indictments against the Jews, a public burning of the Talmud is carried out, a work deemed heretical and an instrument of anti-Christian hatred.

The Mongol Batu coordinates an army composed of three of the four uluses of the Mongol Empire. With Ogodei’s sons, Chagtai and Tolui, he attacks the Volga Bulgars and destroys all the Cuman principalities he encounters.

Florence mints the silver grosso, following in the footsteps of Venice.