Season 1, Episode 176

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Joan endorses the son of Bernardo d’Alpicato for an ecclesiastical position, a canonry, in Aragon.

Today’s Document

• Subject: a standard endorsement for a canonry post
• Date: June 18, 1387
• Day of the Week: Tuesday
• Language: Latin
• Archival Reference Number: ACA CR R1867 f5v
• Link to PARES
• Place: Barcelona
• Sender: Joan
• Recipients: Cardinals and clergy in Aragon and some religious figures in Urgell

Historical Thinking Notes

• Sourcing: Joan refers to correspondence or pre-existing connections between his brother Martí and the father of the person being recommended, Bernardo d’Alpicato; the network connections appear as a major motivation for this recommendation

• Contextualization: the involvement of the king in the process of filling job vacancies for church postings had been very well established by this time; certainly support for the Avignon Pope in the context of the Great Western Schism was a dominant factor for anyone attempting to get royal endorsement for an ecclesiastical position, because Joan had changed the policy of the Crown of Aragon from neutrality to full support of Avignon

• Corroboration: this document appears consistent with other recommendations for ecclesiastical posts, a regular type of official document issued by Joan and Violant

• Close-Reading: a close reading of the probata, both for this document and the one above it on the same folio, lead me to see this as possibly a piece of evidence related to the question of Joan and Violant’s co-rule; Bartolomeo Sirvent, Violant’s main scribe, wrote today’s document and Violant is directly credited in the May 15th document which ends on the top half of this folio

What is this document doing?

• This document presumes that gaining favor with a member of the royal family is a suitable qualification for an ecclesiastical post.
• The document draws on social network connections in its justification for a job recommendation.

Questions

• What qualifications did Bernardo d’Alpicato’s son have for this canonry?
• Was this recommendation a routine matter or was there anything unusual about it?
• What was Martí’s role in the process? Did he know Bernardo d’Alpicato’s son?
• Was Violant involved in the creation of this document in any way?

AI Usage

The new usage limit imposed by Anthropic made my usual AI workflow impossible, so I used Google Translate for my own transcription of this document. Without the help of the LLMs, I have far fewer clues about who are the subjects and who are the direct/indirect objects in these sentences.

Bibliography

• Bisson, Thomas N. Medieval Crown of Aragon: A Short History. Clarendon Press, 1986.
• Rollo-Koster, Joëlle, and Thomas M. Izbicki, eds. A Companion to the Great Western Schism (1378-1417). Brill, 2009.

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