Season 1, Episode 83

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Joan instructs the Roussillon governor to meet Isabella de Mallorca when she arrives to the Salses Fort.

Today’s Document

• Subject: instructions for meeting Isabella de Mallorca at the border crossing
• Date: March 16, 1387 (the March 17th letter on this folio is just pleasantries to the King of Castile)
• Day of the Week: Sunday
• Language: Catalan
• Archival Reference Number: ACA CR R1751 f26v
• Link to PARES
• Place: Barcelona
• Sender: Joan
• Recipient: Governor of Roussillon

Historical Thinking Notes

• Sourcing: Joan chose a very high ranking person, the governor, to handle this task, not merely a bailiff; as king, Joan concerned himself with the movements of any political rival, even if their power had diminished to very little, such as the case with Isabella de Mallorca

• Contextualization: Joan’s father, Pere the Ceremonious, waged a bitter war against Isabella de Majorca’s father in order to keep the island a territory within the Crown of Aragon; a later attempt at a breakaway rebellion resulted in the death of Isabell’s brother, James IV of Majorca, in 1375; by the time of this journey, Isabella de Mallorca probably lacked any substantial political leverage

• Corroboration: the document examined in Episode 61 corroborates this one in Joan’s attention to the details of Isabella de Majorca’s visit to the Crown of Aragon

• Close-Reading: the probata statements on this page merited close attention, as the scribe is Bartolomeo Sirvent, one of Violant’s principle scribes; possibly Sirvent’s presence in Joan’s register is an indication that Joan and Violant worked on a document together

What is this document doing?

• This document establishes close monitoring of a traveler, starting at a border crossing point.
• The document moves the apparatus of the state to track a person’s movements.

Questions

• Did Joan want to be informed of Isabella’s movements because he did not trust her? Or was it for her protection? Both?
• Was it standard practice for all high status visitors to pass through a single check point, such as this fort?
• Was the Salses Fort a required checkpoint for everyone entering the Crown of Aragon from southern France?
• How did Isabella de Mallorca feel about her upcoming journey into the Crown of Aragon? Apprehensive?

Additional Notes

The Salses Fort still exists today but the Wikipedia page says that it is a fifteenth-century construction. The remnant of older structures within fifteenth century constructions also came up for the mill discussed in Episode 44.

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.

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