Joan tells his procurator in Mallorca to continue purchasing falcons and hunting birds from India.
Episode 144
ACA CR R f Source: PARES
Sourcing: that the recipient is the Procurador indicates that Joan is asking for some kind of purchase; it is curious that as Violant is asking the Pope for help with counter-magic, Joan is shopping for elite hunting animals
Contextualization: luxurious hunting practices were key in self-fashioning projects for medieval elite men in Western Europe during the Middle Ages (see the bibliography below); at the same time, hunting was not always seen as purely masculine, since excessive hunting was a trait of feminity in some medieval representations1
Corroboration: the document examined in Episode 8 corroborates Joan’s intense interest in hunting even during moments of great tumult; Joan’s interest in hunting dogs from distant locals is corroborated in a document on the same folio as the one examined in Episode 78; the most impactful corroboration would be a document confirming that ‘mandavit mihi’ in the probata indicates that Joan authors the hunting documents himself, even when he is recovering from illness
Close-Reading: the phrase ‘tots los falcons de les agres nostres’ remains confusing because it is not clear what all of the falcons already in Joan’s possession have to do with purchasing more falcons; perhaps this indicates that Joan wanted to trade some of his falcons for others
The transcription and translation of this document was carried out by my OpenClaw pipeline.
Ruth Mazo Karras, “Holy Harlots: Prostitute Saints in Medieval Legend,” Journal of the History of Sexuality 1, no. 1 (1990): 3–32, at 26-27; for excessive hunting as a reflection of a lack of manhood, see John of Salisbury, Policraticus, Book VIII, ed. Clemens C.I. Webb (Oxford: Clarendon, 1909), 390-398 (Cap.4). ↩