Raymond-Roupen

Raymond-Roupen (also Raymond-Rupen and Ruben-Raymond; 1198 – 1219 or 1221/1222) was a member of the House of Poitiers who claimed the thrones of the Principality of Antioch and Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia. His succession in Antioch was prevented by his paternal uncle Bohemond IV, but his maternal great-uncle Leo I of Cilicia recognized him as heir presumptive to Cilicia and pressed his claim to Antioch. In 1211 Raymond-Roupen was crowned junior king of Cilicia, and was finally installed as Prince of Antioch in 1216. The War of the Antiochene Succession ended with Leo's death in 1219, shortly before Raymond-Roupen was ousted from Antioch. He then pursued his claim to Cilicia, which Leo had unexpectedly willed to his daughter Isabella on his deathbed, but was defeated and imprisoned until death.

== Succession uncertainty == The marriage of Raymond-Roupen's parents, Raymond of Antioch and Alice of Armenia, was arranged in 1195 to end the hostilities between the Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia and the Latin Principality of Antioch and to eventually unite them under one ruler. The idea failed when Raymond died in early 1197, leaving Alice pregnant. She gave birth to a posthumous son, Raymond-Roupen. The infant was heir apparent to his grandfather Bohemond III of Antioch by primogeniture, but this principle was not upheld in the Latin East. Instead, the fiefs passed by the proximity of blood, which favored Bohemond III's surviving children. Raymond-Roupen's grandfather was elderly and unlikely to live until Raymond-Roupen reached the age of majority, making an undesirable Armenian-dominated regency likely if Raymond-Roupen were to succeed him.