Season 1, Episode 16

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Violant writes to Maria de Luna, her sister-in-law, Martí’s wife, asking Maria to come to Barcelona as soon as possible.

Today’s Document

• Subject: Violant asks Maria de Luna to come to Barcelona
• Date: January 9, 1387
• Day of the Week: Wednesday
• Archival Reference Number: ACA CR R1819 f73r
• Link to PARES
• Place: Barcelona
• Sender: Violant
• Recipient: Maria de Luna

Historical Thinking Notes

• Sourcing: the important thing about the recipient of this letter is that Maria de Luna’s family is extremely wealthy and powerful in Catalonia; this source of power would likely feature prominently in Violant’s plans to shore up the authority of the new reign; Maria’s support should be expected as an extension of Martí’s loyalty, but having her close by would allow Violant to more closely exert her influence on Maria to act in concert with whatever plans Violant is hatching;

• Contextualization: for elite women in the Late Middle Ages, networking provided them with access to increasing levels of power - Margaret Paston is another good exmaple of this; at the same time, recent scholars, especially Theresa Earenfight, have problematized the dividing line between ‘soft’ power and ‘hard’ power, characterizing power as a ‘shape-shifter’ ¹

• Corroboration: I really want to find other letters that Violant has written to Maria de Luna to track how this one might be more commanding and not as much in the tone of a request; also, if I had the time to dig further into the finer details of January 1387, I would want to read Maria’s letters to see if anything comes to light regarding her feelings about Violant

• Close-Reading: the key phrase here appears to be ‘vos pregam al pus breu que porets cuyrets vostre venguda’ which ChatGPT thinks is a ‘clear summons, not a friendly invitation’; I’m not ready to make a commitment as to whether this is a summons versus a polite request, but I do agree with ChatGPT’s interpretation that this letter is helping to ‘consolidate the new female political network of the reign’

What is this document doing?

• This document centers Violant in the power network of a newly forming monarchy.
• The document also relies on tropes of family connection to put additional justification and legitimation into association with its political objectives

Questions

• How much interaction have Violant and Maria de Luna had? What do they think of each other?
• Violant mentions that her stepdaughter Joanna, age 13, is with her in Barcelona. Where is her son Jaume?
• Is Maria already in full support of Violant? Why or why not?
• What in these series of letters at the outset of Violant’s reign indicates her latent power, as well as the power that she exercises through direct orders?

AI Usage

I’m wasn’t sure if I needed AI for this letter, but I wanted to see if I was missing anything. ChatGPT alerted me to a possible interpretation of this letter as a more assertive exercise of power by Violant than I had initially thought of it. I think it’s worthwhile to consider the possibility that this letter came across to Maria de Luna as a summons, which would say a lot about the power dynamic at play. The ChatGPT transcript includes my full transcription of this letter.

Bibliography

• Bratsch-Prince, Dawn E. “A Reappraisal of the Correspondence of Violant de Bar (1365-1431).” Catalan Review: International Journal of Catalan Culture 8, nos. 1–2 (1994): 295–312.
• Bratsch-Prince, Dawn. “‘Dones Que Feyan d’homens’: The Construction of Gender in the Writing of Medieval Catalan History.” La Corónica: A Journal of Medieval Hispanic Languages, Literatures & Cultures 32, no. 3 (2004): 35–47.
• Casteen, Elizabeth. From She-Wolf to Martyr: The Reign and Disputed Reputation of Johanna I of Naples. Cornell University Press, 2015.
• Earenfight, Theresa. “A Lifetime of Power, Beyond Binaries of Gender.” In Medieval Elite Women and the Exercise of Power, 1100–1400: Moving beyond the Exceptionalist Debate, edited by Heather J. Tanner, 271-293. Palgrave Macmillan, 2019.
• Kelleher, Marie A. “What Do We Mean by” Women and Power”?” Medieval Feminist Forum: A Journal of Gender and Sexuality 51, no. 2 (2016): 104–15.
• Silleras-Fernandez, Nuria. Power, Piety, and Patronage in Late Medieval Queenship: Maria de Luna. Palgrave Macmillan, 2008.

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