Season 1, Episode 81

Return to episodes list

Joan orders government officials in Valencia to report to him about their pursuit of a financial criminal.

Today’s Document

• Subject: law enforcement action against financial criminals in Valencia
• Date: March 15, 1387
• Day of the Week: Friday
• Language: Catalan
• Archival Reference Number: ACA CR R1751 f27r
• Link to PARES
• Place: Barcelona
• Sender: Joan
• Recipients: Portaveus de Governador de Valencia

Historical Thinking Notes

• Sourcing: most general or political historians of medieval Iberia characterize Joan as uninterested in financial management, so this letter, which shows him seeking more details about particular financial crimes, complicates that narrative

• Contextualization: to sum extent, circumstances required Joan to attend to at least some high-level financial crises; Pere the Ceremonious, in his decision to default on loans from the banking firm of des Cuas and d’Olivella, largely created the financial crisis of the early 1380s that the royal treasury never really recovered from¹

• Corroboration: previous documents examined in Episode 47 and Episode 63 have been about financial crimes in Valencia, although it is not clear if this document is about a newly discovered crime

• Close-Reading: I interpreted ‘physch’ as ‘fisc’ and this is my strongest support for my interpretation of the crimes discussed in this letter being financial crimes; my interpretation is strengthened by the mention of Julius Garrius, a long-time official of Joan’s treasury; the word ‘anotar’ suggests that Joan seeks greater details about the crime committeed

What is this document doing?

• This document activates another layer of the royal bureacracy in order to further the capture of those deemed responsible for financial misdeeds.
• The document connects law authority in Valencia to the direct interests of the king.

Questions

• How does a portantveus relate to a veguer or a bailiff?
• What were the crimes and why were they multiple (diverses)?
• Why had this crime risen to the level of Joan’s attention?
• What about this situation made two documents necessary?
• Why do the two letters begin slightly differently and how is that related to their recipients?
• Was this connected to any of other news from Valencia in other letters around this time?

AI Usage

I used Gemini for an initial transcription, which I then had Claude reconcile with its own initial transcription. Claude then produced a translation into English with footnotes. I also asked ChatGPT about the term portantveus.

Bibliography

• Bisson, Thomas N. Medieval Crown of Aragon: A Short History. Clarendon Press, 1986.
• Feliu i Montfort, Gaspar. “Finances, Currency and Taxation in the 14th and 15th Centuries.” Catalan Historical Review, no. 9 (2016): 25–44.
• Ferrer i Mallol, Maria Teresa. “Catalan Commerce in the Late Middle Ages.” Catalan Historical Review, no. 5 (2012): 5.
• Hillgarth, J. N. (Jocelyn Nigel). The Spanish Kingdoms, 1250-1516. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1978.
• Kagay, Donald J. “Poetry in the Dock: The Court Culture of Joan I on Trial (1396-1398).” In Donald J. Kagay, War, Government, and Society in the Medieval Crown of Aragon, XI, 48-99. Variorum Collected Studies Series, CS 861. Ashgate/Variorum, 2007.

← return to episode list