Hello. In The Crown of Aragon, 639 years ago,
it was March 6, 1387. My name is Jonathan Seyfried.
I'm a PhD candidate in history at the University
of New Mexico. And this is the Historian's Notebook,
a podcast about how history gets made. Season
one is titled Molt Cara Companyona. We're looking
at a document from each day of the first year
of the reign of King Joan I of Aragon and Queen
Violant de Bar. Let's begin today's document.
So we're supposed to be doing a document per
day for Joan and Violant. And today we're
going to kind of bend that rule a bit. We've
got a bunch of documents and one of them actually
takes us back in time to late February. So just
a... about a week or 10 days or so prior to March
6th. And the reason for that is I was learning
a little bit more about how to navigate the system
of dating and. ordering in these registers, and
I was working for a long time on the document
that we're going to start with today, which is
actually dated on the 27th of February. And the
reason I got confused, you'll see if you look
at the image for folio 17v, because it looks
like there's a little letter at the top that
finishes and then the probata for that letter
of about I think it's eight lines is off to the
right hand side of the folio and then it's not
too uncommon for the next thing unrelated to
that probata to start on pretty much like the
same level on the page like horizontally right
next to it, like what we see here. So we've got
this interesting new shape. There's a lot of
squiggly lines that the scribes like to use.
Here we have what looks like a big C, and then
a line down, and then a horizontal line with
some little squigglies in the middle. And these
had different meanings, and they're haven't yet
found a source that explains all of them, so
I think when we have a dividing line like this,
it has some kind of meaning attached to it that
the scribes would have known, but maybe has been
lost to time. And so it's not uncommon in this
situation, looking at this document, to say,
and rightfully so, that what appears on the second
two -thirds of the page is something unrelated
to what appears at the top. It turns out that
I was wrong in thinking that in this situation,
but what it led me to do is to keep flipping
forward to try to find a date. And so looking
at the next folio, which is 18R, there's no date.
And so I turned again and then got to a series
of letters that are dated March 6th. OK, another
thing that led me to conflate what I saw on folio
18V, which is three letters all dated March 6th
with the two folios that came before. Back on
February 28th, we talked about letters that Violant
had written to the Pope authorizing Luchino Scarampi,
the Genoese financier, to talk to the Pope about
marriage negotiations for Joan and Violant's
daughter, Yolande of Aragon. And here we have
three letters that follow the same pattern of
salutation as those three letters from February
28th. My Latin group is still working on those
February 28th letters, so I have them top of
mind. So when I saw this on folio 18v in Joan's
register, I immediately recognized, okay, we've
got the serenissime et beatissime pater for the
pope. And then we've got two letters each with
reverende pater et amice carissime for some
other groups of clerics. It also turns out that
we have specified clerics. listed for the second
and third letter in this three -letter set on
Joan's register, and that might help us to
figure out who the intended recipients were for
the letters in Violant's register that followed
the same group of three pattern. So, okay, that's
a lot to say that it made me connect the stuff
that had come before, which is about Scarampi
and about the marriage, to the date of March
6th. But now that I've been looking at this for
a while, I'm thinking that the information that's
on the second two -thirds of The second part,
the second and third. Oh gosh, what am I trying
to say here? The bottom 60 % of folio 17v. I
think that information is actually connected
to the February 27th letter, but I can't be completely
sure about that. It's just what I'm guessing
now. And likewise for the end of that. information
on folio 18R. Okay, so before we go further along,
because there's actually eight folios that I
want to talk about today, I just want to cover
what's going on in folio 17V and folio 18R. Folio
17V begins with an authorization for Luchino Scarampi
to carry out negotiations for the marriage of
Joan and Violant's daughter. To who? To Louis
of Anjou. And I actually got really confused
because... On the first line of the, gosh, it's
the chunk that's right below where it says the
capitula credentiae super addicte, so that heading
in the middle separates out what's coming below
from the letter above, and then the first chunk
reads, and this is in Catalan, sobre Fet del
matrimoni tractador del rei Loys de Sicilia e
de... and then some other stuff. Okay, so this
whole L -O -Y -S got me really confused because
I didn't... I thought it was like a region. because
I hadn't quite settled on Sicilia as the transcription
there for what came after the day. And so I got
really just off into some weird thinking about
this. But then what I did is I went to the Diccionario
uh, let's see, what is it? The Catalan Valence
Balaeri. And that's like the Oxford English Dictionary,
but for like Catalan and Valencian. And so I
put in L -O -Y -S, and it came back as Luis.
Luis. So that's Louis. So that's the person that,
indeed, Joan and Violant's daughter, who's known
as Yolande of Aragon, that's who she ended up
marrying. And so what we are looking at are little
articles that specify some of the terms of the
marriage negotiation for the daughter of Joan
and Violant to Louis of Anjou, who at this time
was known as King Louis of Sicily. for reasons
that are so complicated, because I know I've
already talked about how Sicily was like a territory
of the Crown of Aragon, but alas, we don't have
time to dig into that in all that much detail
right now. I'll link to an episode prior where
I talked about Sicily a little bit more. The
thing I want to point out about some of these
marriage terms, and there's a couple different
things being addressed here, but the dowry amount
is listed, and it's listed. Get this. It's listed
as 100 ,000 florins. Oh my gosh. That is so much
money. And when I saw that it was 100 ,000 florins
as the dowry, I had something click in my mind
about why it is that Luchino Scarampi is in
charge, because I think he's going to be the
one that facilitates the transfer of that gigantic
sum. Cannot be in coins. It's just too much to
be able to gather all of that physical coinage,
so this is definitely a money of account. There
were certain times where coins were required,
such as when paying a ransom, like if you were
talking about some kind of active piracy, then
there might be a requirement to make the payment
in coin. But this is almost certainly going to
be carried out as a payment of account, meaning
that it's just going to be a transfer on paper.
And for that amount of money, you're going to
have to have some sophisticated financial infrastructure.
And I think that Luchino Scarampi is the one
that can provide that for this transaction. One
other thing to point out about this set of terms
for the marriage negotiation that is entrusted
to Scarampi. At the end of it on Folio 18R, notice
the probata. It's super interesting because it's
actually both Bartolomeo Sirvent, who is Violante's
scribe. And actually, Bartolomeo Sirvent did
the letter on the previous folio, too. And then
here, though, it's Bartolomeo Sirvent being given,
commanded this by the king. And then below that,
in line three of the probata, we also have the
queen Domina Regina. So they're co -writing this
through the scribe Bartolomeo Sirvent. This
is not just Joan and that's really important
because you might think initially, because it's
in his register, that this should be attributed
to Joann. It's not. This document is written
by both of them together, and there's no way
to deny that level of cooperation based on this
probata, and also the fact that violante scribe
is taking the lead. That's interesting. All right,
now we're on folio 18V turning the page. And
here we've got the three letters that I mentioned
before, already kind of talked about these. that
we've got the same pattern as what Violant had
in her three letters that she sent along with
Luchino Scarampi, but why are these letters that
Joan has written, and it's joan's scribe
here, his name is Pere de Beniure, why is it that
these letters are several days later on March
6th. They match the pattern of Violant's letters
from February 28th. That is a mystery to me.
The clues about the destination of the second
and third letter are that the second letter has
an addressee line, fuet missa collegio cardinalium.
So, the College of Cardinals. And then the third
letter has an addressee line. Fuit, Missa, Cardinal,
maybe this could be singular, Cardinal, Emrudenem,
or Denen. It's hard to read because the scribe
actually crossed out another Cardinal's name
there. Although it seems like... Well, is this
a single cardinal or is it? I guess it's I guess
it's single. Yeah, because you can see that it's
in the nouns are in singular endings in the beginning.
So that's interesting. OK, so now turning the
page, we have a new capitula at the top. This
is also going to be dated. March 6th, you have
to flip forward a couple pages in order to get
to where you would find the date all the way
to folio 21 R. So I think that's where we see
that this is still March 6th and we don't have
a date until we get there. and what begins on
folio 19r and ends on folio 21r is this long
list of of items gosh i would i i said items
because the word etem is used at the beginning
of each paragraph, and it's just so tempting
to say it's an item. But item actually means
likewise. So these different, do we call them
requests? Do we call them demands? Do we call
them points? I'm not quite sure because I don't
know how much Joann's clout is in relation to
the Avignon Pope. The ambassadors have been appointed,
and these points are ones that were given to
them to take to the Pope. How do I know that?
The top of the folio has this capitula credentiae
ambassia toribus andictis. That means that this
is the section of credentials for the ambassadors
that have been appointed. So, Shewan is appointed
ambassadors to go to Avignon and to present these
these requests or or I I don't know if they're
requests or if they're more like expected, like
whether Joan is expecting them to be fulfilled.
So that is a question that maybe I can get at
if I do a little bit more research about how
much leverage Joan had. It's really interesting
that Luchino Scarampi is going to take care
of the wedding negotiation, and that negotiation
is taking place in Avignon. And then Joan has
appointed some other ambassadors, specifically
a knight named Pere d'Artes, and also the Archbishop
of Zaragoza, whose name is Garcia, and then
another person who I think is a chamberlain named
Raymond de Francia, and the three of them are
going to go to Avignon and present these articles
to—oh, I like that, the word article—these articles
to the pope. And what's in these articles? It's
a real grab bag of stuff. Some of it is like,
I'd like that this particular monastery or abbey
gets elevated to be a bishopric and then other
things are specific to the status of office holders
and who, and you can't double up on the office,
the ecclesiastical office holders. There's certain
objections that Joan is raising to foreigners,
quote unquote foreigners, who are being appointed
to ecclesiastical positions inside the crown
of Aragon, and he does not like that and wants
that to stop. And then there's this really interesting
moment that is on Folio 19V and it's in the first
article there, line seven has this phrase Bartolomeo
antipope, the antipope. So Clement the 7th of
Avignon has gone down in history as the antipope.
but from the perspective of his supporters, with
Joan being one of his most fervent supporters,
the other pope, the one in Rome, is the one who's
rightfully referred to as the anti -pope. So
Joan here is addressing an issue that came up
as a result of dealings with the in his mind,
the wrong pope, the one in Rome. That one is
the anti -pope. So what's being discussed here?
Well, the line above, line six, is about his
father. And in the middle of the line, we have
the word indifferencia, which is, I think, a
Catalan word that's been put in to this Latin
paragraph. The indifferencia domini sui genitoris.
So he's talking about his father's indifference.
Pere refused to take a side in the Great Western
Schism and consequences of that neutrality came
down, I think, in terms of certain restrictions
that or certain losses that now that Joan is
throwing his full support behind Avignon Pope
Clement VII, Joan wants these things to be restored
and there's certain possessions, I think, that
are being referred to here. I'm looking at a
couple words after antipope on line seven, and
I'm seeing that there's this possessorem, and
so I think there's certain rights or even revenues
that were restricted from the Crown of Aragon
because pair refused to support wholeheartedly
the Avignon Pope. All right. One other thing
I want to point out in these articles, which
are, you know, can get very in the weeds. I feel
like, you know, if someone was doing a dissertation
on the Great Western Schism and the Crown of
Aragon, The documents that I'm looking at today,
the eight folios in this register, they could
be a whole dissertation chapter because of how
much is packed in here and how how weedsy it
can get. I did just want to point out something
though, which is on folio 20 R. and it's in the
article that is the third so there's a long chunky
one and then the third article has in its last
well second to last line a mention of innocent
and urban so these are popes from long ago and
i just wanted to point out that And it's not
even all that important what's being discussed
here in the article, but the larger point is
that when the kings of this time were trying
to justify what they wanted from the pope, they
could reach back in history to decades and sometimes
centuries earlier to this knowledge of what had
been done in earlier times and the precedents
and the patterns that had been set in place way
long ago. And I think that this can even apply
to something that appears at the very end of
this list of articles where the name Gregory
is mentioned. It's in the last line of Folio
20V, and I think possibly this is a nod to how
there's been this long tradition that Joann is
saying he's aware of and that everything he's
requesting is in line with. I think potentially
this is some other Gregory, but... Yeah, my Latin
and understanding of these documents is not good
enough to really know for sure, but just the
fact that Gregory, that name is mentioned, and
that's got such an amazing cachet from, you know,
the legacy of Gregory the Great. I think what
we're seeing here is a display of in -depth knowledge
of ecclesiastical history and a very sophisticated
argument for all of these articles that are being
justified. We're not even done, because on the
eighth folio that we're looking at today we have
yet another document from Joan This one on folio
21R also dated March 6th. And then tomorrow we're
going to look at the bottom half of this folio,
where there's one from March 7th. But I just
wanted to say that, you know, all of those prior
letters to the clerics that we were looking at
before all of the articles for the ambassadors
That was not enough. There was some other person,
and it seems like this letter was actually copied.
There was some other person that needed to be
addressed. And I think what we're looking at
at the bottom of this letter is a addressee clause
that's very similar to what we were looking at
on February 28th. with the letters from Violant's
that had no addressee. Because if you look at that
addressee line at the bottom, we see similis, fuiter,
and then two words I cannot quite make out, but
then the last two words of that line are sine
supra, then the last line, scripcione, and then
23. Does that mean that they made 23 copies of
this? That can't be. That can't, well, maybe,
maybe that is what that means. Goodness. That
would be something if they, if they made 23 copies
of that letter to give to sort of random ecclesiastical
officials, but I'm not sure. Oh gosh, and then
there's one other thing that I want to point
out because I'm starting to learn about the little
notes that come after the year in the dating
clause, so stuff that comes at the very end.
Sometimes it's easy, it just says la reyna or
rex johannes and you know exactly what that means,
but here We have Franciscus Sacosta. That is
the vice chancellor for Joan, and that is a different
person than the scribe, because very clearly
we have a probata, Dominus Rex mandavit mihi
pere de beniure. So what is the vice chancellor's
name? doing at the end of this letter? That is
a question that I don't quite know how to answer
right now, but I feel like I'm on the verge of
being able to figure that out. Did the vice chancellor
sign this letter? And it's thrown into Joan's
register? Not sure at this time. Oh my gosh,
I've broken 30 minutes. No! Oh, I had a goal
to keep all the episodes under 30 minutes because
the actual, like, intent is to have 15 minute
episodes. And here I am. But it was eight folios,
folks. My gosh. Like, how am I going to talk
about eight folios in less than 30 minutes? Just
can't do it. Well, thanks for bearing with me
on another long episode of the Historian's Notebook,
Season 1, Molt Cara Companyona. If you are leaving
with more questions than you arrived with, and
if you would like to write a long journal article
or master's thesis about... the Crown of Aragon
during the Great Schism and want to use these
documents? Well, you probably need a lot more
information, and having all of those questions
means I have done my job, because remember, the
motto of the Historian's Notebook is dissatisfaction
guaranteed. visit the website to see an image
of today's document and additional show notes.
And listen again tomorrow to hear about the next
day in the first year of the reign of King Joan
I of Aragon and Queen Violant de Bar. In the
meantime, take care.