Season 1, Episode 135

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An order under Joan’s name goes out to the officials of Perpignan and the surrounding region to transfer the pirate Bartolomeo Perich to Barcelona to face justice.

Today’s Document

• Subject: prisoner transport from Perpignan to Barcelona
• Date: May 8, 1387
• Day of the Week: Wednesday
• Language: Latin
• Archival Reference Number: ACA CR R1826 f131v-132r
• Link to PARES
• Place: Barcelona
• Sender: Joan
• Recipients: Officials of Roussillon, Cerdagne, and Perpignan

Historical Thinking Notes

• Sourcing: possibly concerned that the authorities in Perpignan might treat Bartolomeo Perich too lightly, Joan uses his authority as head of state to ensure that a pirate faces justice in Barcelona

• Contextualization: pirates were a constant presence in the Medieval Mediterranean; for context about piracy on the Mediterranean, a great place to start is Fernand Braudel’s The Mediterranean and the Mediterranean World in the Age of Philip II¹

• Corroboration: in Episode 116 we examined a document about piracy in which Joan considers them a threat and then in Episode 125 we looked at a document about a pirate clearly allied to Catalan interests

• Close-Reading: this document employs the word ‘maleficis’ in a way that seems to have nothing to do with magic or evil sorcery

What is this document doing?

• This document portrays piracy wholly as a criminal category.
• The document reveals the importance of different jurdisdictions and forums in outcomes of criminal cases.

Questions

• How much involvement did Joan have in the authorship of this document?
• Who was Bartolomeo Perich and what kinds of acts of piracy had he committed?
• Was the rivalry with Genoa involved in this case?

AI Usage

I gave an initial transcription by Gemini to Claude for a reconciliation. Claude then produced a translation with footnotes. I then used ChatGPT to research Bartolomeo Perich. The output from this latest versions of Claude and ChatGPT were more detailed and organized compared to earlier versions just a few months ago.

Bibliography

• Braudel, Fernand. The Mediterranean and the Mediterranean World in the Age of Philip II. Vol 1. [print. of the ed. of 1972] Harper & Row, 1990.
• Ferrer i Mallol, Maria Teresa. “Corso y piratería entre Mediterráneo y Atlántico en la Baja Edad Media.” In La Península Ibérica entre el Mediterráneo y el Atlántico: siglos XIII-XV : Cádiz, 1-4 de abril de 2003, edited by Manuel González Jiménez and Isabel Montes Romero-Camacho, 255-322. Sociedad Española de Estudios Medievales, 2006.
• Trenchs i Odena, Josep, Antonio María Aragó, and Rafael Conde y Delgado de Molina. Las cancillerías de la Corona de Aragón y Mallorca desde Jaime I a la muerte de Juan II. Institución “Fernando el Católico,” 1983.

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