The event is represented in a rare surviving illustration from a now fragmentary manuscript known as the 'Cocharelli Codex', thought to have been created in Genoa in the 1330s.

The image shows the countess Lucia, Countess of Tripoli and Bartholomew, Bishop of Tortosa (granted the apostolic seat in 1278)[1] sitting in state in the centre of the fortified city, and Qalawun's assault in 1289, with his army depicted massacring the inhabitants fleeing to boats in the harbour and to the nearby island of St Thomas.

[3] After the destruction of Baghdad and the capture of Damascus, which were the centers of the Abbasid and Ayyubid caliphates respectively, by the Khan Hulegu, Islamic power had shifted to the Egyptian Mamluks based in Cairo.

The Mamluks took advantage of this to advance northwards from Egypt, and re-establish dominion over Palestine and Syria, pushing the Ilkhans back into Persia.

Abaqa Khan, the ruler of the Ilkhanate, who had been sent envoys to Europe in an attempt to form a Franco-Mongol alliance against the Muslims, had died in 1282.

After Bohemond VII's premature death in from 1287, his sister Lucia of Tripoli, living in Apulia with her husband Narjot de Toucy, rightfully should have succeeded him.

The knights and barons united in 1288 to countermand the Bohemond family's dynastic claims and replace it with a republican style commune under the leadership of Bartholomew Embriaco of Gibelet, Lord of Besmedin in Byblos.

The Genoese consuls agreed, on the condition that they receive larger quarters in the old part of Tripoli and increased residency privileges.

[8] Bartholomew also secretly negotiated with Lucia, agreeing to recognise her title provided she accept the authority of the commune and not grant the Genoese any additional concessions.

When the arrangements between Lucia and Benedetto became public, concern was voiced about the unfair advantage of Genoese maritime trading operations in the region.

The 'Templar of Tyre' reports that "two people went down to Alexandria" to apprise the sultan that the Genoese, if left unchecked, would potentially dominate the Levant and obstruct or eliminate Mamluk trade:[9] "the Genoese will pour into Tripoli from all sides; and if they hold Tripoli, they will rule the waves, and it will happen that those who will come to Alexandria will be at their mercy ...

The Mamluks overran the crumbling walls, and captured the city on 26 April, marking the end of an uninterrupted Christian rule of 180 years, the longest of any of the major Frankish conquests in the Levant.