Principality of Catalonia

Like much of the Mediterranean coast of the Iberian Peninsula, it was colonized by Ancient Greeks, who chose to settle in Roses. Both Greeks and Carthaginians interacted with the main Iberian population. After the Carthaginian defeat, it became, along with the rest of Hispania, a part of the Roman Empire, Tarraco being one of the main Roman posts in the Iberian Peninsula and the capital of the province of Tarraconensis.[11]

Wilfred the Hairy, depicted in the Genealogy of the Kings of Aragon, c. 1400

The Visigoths ruled after the Western Roman Empire's collapse near the end of the 5th century. Moorish Al-Andalus gained control in the early 8th century, after conquering the Visigothic kingdom in 711–718. After the defeat of Emir Abdul Rahman Al Ghafiqiwas's troops at Tours in 732, the Franks gradually gained control of the former Visigoth territories north of the Pyrenees, which had been captured by the Muslims or had become allied with them, in what is today Catalonia under French administration. In 795, Charlemagne created what came to be known by historiography and some Frankish chronicles as the Marca Hispanica, a buffer zone beyond the province of Septimania, made up of locally administered separate counties which served as a defensive barrier between the Umayyad of Al-Andalus and the Frankish Kingdom.[12]

A distinctive Catalan culture started to develop in the Middle Ages stemming from a number of these small counties throughout the northernmost part of Catalonia. The counts of Barcelona were Frankish vassals nominated by the Carolingian emperor then the king of the Franks, to whom they were feudatories (801–988). In 878, Wilfred the Hairy, count of Urgell and Cerdanya, was appointed count of Barcelona, Girona and Osona. Since then, these last three counties were always ruled by the same person, becoming the political core of the future Principality of Catalonia. Upon his death in 897 Wilfred made their titles hereditaries and thus founded the dynasty of the House of Barcelona, which ruled Catalonia until the death of Martin I, its last ruling member, in 1410. Many abbeys were founded between the ninth century and the twelfth century while in the cities the episcopal seats were restored, forming important artistic and intellectual centers. These religious centers contribute to an important diffusion of the Romanesque art in Catalonia (monasteries of Santa Maria de Ripoll and Montserrat, collegiate church of Cardona, cathedral of Girona...) as well as to the maintenance of rich libraries nourished by Classical, Visigothic and Arab works. The scholar and mathematician Gerbert d'Aurillac (future pope under the name of Sylvester II) studied in Vic and Ripoll and it was introduced in Arabic knowledge of mathematics and astronomy.[13]

The County of Barcelona (in blue-grey) at the death of Ramon Berenguer III (1131)

In 988 Count Borrell II did not recognise the Frankish king Hugh Capet and his new dynasty, effectively taking Barcelona out of Frankish rule.[14] From that point on, the counts of Barcelona often referred to themselves as princeps (prince), in order to show their preeminence over the other Catalan counts.[15] During the 9th and 10th centuries, the counties increasingly became a society of aloers, peasant proprietors of small, family-based farms, who lived by subsistence agriculture and owed no formal feudal allegiance. At the start of the 11th century the Catalan Counties suffer an important process of feudalisation, as the miles formed links of vassalage over this previously independent peasantry. The middle years of the century were characterized by virulent class warfare. Seigniorial violence was unleashed against the peasants, utilizing new military tactics, based on contracting well armed mercenary soldiers mounted on horses. By the end of the century, most of the aloers had been converted into vassals.[16] During the regency of countess Ermesinde of Carcassonne (1017-1057), which received the government of Barcelona after the death of her husband the count Ramon Borrell,[17] the disintegration of central power was evident.

Petronilla of Aragon and Ramon Berenguer IV, Count of Barcelona, dynastic union of the Crown of Aragon. 16th-century painting by Filippo Ariosto

The response of the Catholic Church to the feudal violence was the establishment of the sagreres around churches and the movement of Peace and Truce of God.[18] The first assembly of Peace and Truce was presided by Abbot Oliba in Toulouges, Roussillon in 1027.[19] The grandson of Ermesinde, count Ramon Berenguer I, began the codification of Catalan law in the written Usages of Barcelona[20] which was to become the first full compilation of feudal law in Western Europe. Legal codification was part of the count's efforts to forward and somehow control the process of feudalization.

Under count Ramon Berenguer III, the County of Barcelona experienced a new phase of territorial expansion.[21] This included a joint Catalan and Pisan Crusade against the Taifa of Majorca (1114) and the conquest of Tarragona (1116), restoring in the last one the archiepiscopal see of the city (1119), disbanded after the Muslim conquest. That meant the independence of the Catalan Church from the bishopric of Narbonne.[22]

In 1137 Count Ramon Berenguer IV of Barcelona married Queen Petronilla of Aragon, establishing the dynastic union of the County of Barcelona and its dominions with the Kingdom of Aragon, which was to create the Crown of Aragon.[23] The reign of Ramon Berenguer IV saw the Catalan conquest of Lleida and Tortosa. Their son, Alfons, was the first king of Aragon who, in turn was the count of Barcelona, titles all the kings of the Crown of Aragon inherited from then on.[24] During the reign of Alfons, in 1173, Catalonia was legally delimited for the first time, while the first compilation of the Usages of Barcelona was made in the process to turn them into the law of Catalonia (Consuetudinem Cathalonie).[10] Apart from the Usages, between 1170 and 1195 the Liber feudorum maior and the Gesta Comitum Barchinonensium were compiled and written, being considered together as the three milestones of Catalan political identity.[25]

James I the Conqueror

His son, king Peter II of Aragon, faced the defense of the Occitan territories, acquired from the times of Ramon Berenguer I onwards, from the Albigensian Crusade. The Battle of Muret (12 September 1213) and the unexpected defeat of King Peter and his vassals and allies, the counts of Toulouse, Comminges and Foix, against the French-Crusader armies, resulted in the fading of the strong human, cultural and economic ties existing between the ancient territories of Catalonia and the Languedoc.[26]

In the Treaty of Corbeil, 1258, James I of Aragon, descendant of Sunifred and Bello of Carcassonne and therefore heir of the House of Barcelona, relinquished his family rights and dominions in the Languedoc and recognized the Capetian king of France Louis IX as heir of the Carolingian Dynasty. In return, the king of France formally renounced his claims of feudal lordship over all the Catalan counties.[27] This treaty confirmed, from French point of view, the independence of the Catalan counties established and exercised during the previous three centuries, but also meant the irremediable separation between the people of Catalonia and the Languedoc.

As a coastal territory within the Crown of Aragon and with the increasing importance of the port of Barcelona, Catalonia became the main centre of the Crown's maritime power, promoting and helping to expand its influence and power by conquest and trade into Valencia, the Balearic Islands, Sardinia and Sicily.

1702 compilation of Catalan Constitutions

At the same time, the Principality of Catalonia developed a complex institutional and political system based on the concept of pact between the estates of the realm and the king. The laws (called constitutions) had to be approved in the General Court of Catalonia,[28] one of the first parliamentary bodies of Europe that banned the royal power to create legislation unilaterally, sharing it with the estates represented in the Court (since 1283).[29][30] The first Catalan constitutions, derived from the Usages of Barcelona, are of the ones from the Catalan Courts (Corts) of Barcelona from 1283. The last ones were promulgated by the Courts of 1705–1706, presided by the disputed Habsburg king Charles III. The compilations of the Constitutions and other rights of Catalonia followed the Roman tradition of the Codex. This constitutions developed a compilation of rights for the citizenship of the Principality and limited the power of the kings.

Palau de la Generalitat, ancient seat of the Deputation of the General, located in Barcelona

Peter III of Aragon in the Coll de Panissars during the Aragonese Crusade

The General Court of Catalonia (or Catalan Courts), with roots dating from the 11th century, is one of the first parliaments in continental Europe. The Courts were composed by the three estates of the realm and were presided by the king as count of Barcelona.[31][32] The current Parliament of Catalonia is considered the symbolic and historic successor of this institution.[33]

In order to recapt the "tax of the General", the Courts of 1359 established a permanent representation of deputies, called Deputation of the General (in Catalan: Diputació del General) and later usually known as Generalitat, which gained an important political power during the next centuries.[34]

The Principality saw a prosperous period during the 13th century and the first half of the 14th. The population increased; Catalan language and culture expanded into the islands of the Western Mediterranean. The reign of Peter III of Aragon ("the Great") included the conquest of Sicily and the successful defense against a French crusade;[35] his son and successor Alfonso III ("the Generous") conquered Menorca; and Peter's second son James II conquered Sardinia; Catalonia was the center of the empire, expanding and organizing it, establishing institutional systems similar to its own.[36] Barcelona, then the most frequent royal residence, was consolidated as the administrative center of the domains with the establishment of the Royal Archives in 1318.[37][38] The Catalan Company, mercenaries led by Roger de Flor and formed by Almogavar veterans of the War of the Sicilian Vespers, were hired by the Byzantine Empire to fought the Turks, defeating them in several battles. After the assassination of Roger de Flor by orders of the emperor's son Michael Palaiologos (1305), the Company took revenge sacking Byzantine territory, and they conquered the duchies of Athens and Neopatras in the name of the King of Aragon. Catalan rule over Greek lands lasted until 1390.[39]

This territorial expansion was accompanied by a great development of the Catalan trade, centered in Barcelona, creating an extensive trade network across the Mediterranean which competed with those of the maritime republics of Genoa and Venice.[36][40] In this line, institutions were created that would give legal protection to merchants, such as the Consulate of the Sea and the Book of the Consulate of the Sea, one of the first compilations of maritime law.[41]

The second quarter of the 14th century saw crucial changes for Catalonia, marked by a succession of natural catastrophes, demographic crises, stagnation and decline in the Catalan economy, and the rise of social tensions. The year 1333 was known as Lo mal any primer (Catalan: "The first bad year") due to poor wheat harvest.[42] The domains of the Aragonese Crown were affected severely by the Black Death pandemic and by later outbreaks of the plague. Between 1347 and 1497 Catalonia lost 37 percent of its population.[43]

In 1410, King Martin I died without surviving descendants. Under the Compromise of Caspe (1412), Ferdinand from the Castilian House of Trastámara received the Crown of Aragon as Ferdinand I of Aragon.[44] Ferdinand's successor, Alfonso V ("the Magnanimous"), promoted a new stage of Catalan-Aragonese expansion, this time over the Kingdom of Naples, over which he eventually gained rule in 1443. However, he aggravated the social crisis in the Principality of Catalonia, both in the countryside and in the cities. During the reign of John II, social and political tensions caused the Catalan Civil War (1462–1472) and the War of the Remences ("Remença" was a mode of serfdom), 1462-1485. In 1493, France returned the counties of Roussillon and Cerdagne, which it had occupied during the conflict. John's son, Ferdinand II, recovered without war the northern Catalan counties and the Constitució de l'Observança (1481) was approved, establishing the submission of royal power to the laws approved in the Catalan Courts.[45][46] After decades of conflict, the peasants of remença were liberated from most of feudal abuses by the Sentencia Arbitral de Guadalupe (1486), in exchange for a payment.[47]

The Catalan's Revolt "Corpus of Blood" (7 June 1640)

The Battle of Montjuïc (1641), a decisive victory of the Franco-Catalan armies

Pau Claris, president of the Generalitat during the Reapers' War

The color shading shows the division between the Principality of Catalonia (present-Spain) and the counties of Roussillon and Cerdagne (present-France) divided in 1659

The marriage of Isabella I of Castile and Ferdinand II of Aragon (1469) unified two of the three major Christian kingdoms in the Iberian peninsula, while the Kingdom of Navarre was incorporated later following Ferdinand II's 1512 invasion of the Basque kingdom.

This resulted in the reinforcement of the concept of Spain, which was already present in the mind of these kings,[48] made up by the former Crown of Aragon, Castile, and a Navarre annexed to Castile (1515). In 1492, the last remaining portion of Al-Andalus around Granada was conquered and the Spanish conquest of the Americas began. Political power began to shift away from Aragon toward Castile and, subsequently, from Castile to the Spanish Empire, which engaged in frequent warfare in Europe striving for world domination. In 1516 Charles I of Spain became the first king to rule the Crowns of Castile and Aragon simultaneously by his own right. Following the death of his paternal (House of Habsburg) grandfather, Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor, he was also elected Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, in 1519.[49] The reign of Charles V was a relative harmonious period, during which Catalonia generally accepted the new structure of Spain, despite its own marginalization.

For an extended period, Catalonia, as part of the late Crown of Aragon, successfully retained its own institutional system and legislation against the trend observed in southern and central Europe throughout the early modern age, which eroded the importance of representative institutions,[50] until they were finally suppressed as a result of the War of the Spanish Succession defeat at the beginning of the 18th century. The prolonged absence of the monarchs, who resided most of the time in Castile, led to the consolidation of the figure of the viceroy as the representative of the king in the Principality.

Over the next two centuries, Catalonia was generally on the losing side of a series of wars that led steadily to more centralization of power in Spain. Despite this fact, between the 16th and 18th centuries, the role of the political community in local affairs and the general government of the country was increased, while the royal powers remained relatively restricted, specially after the two last Courts (1701–1702 and 1705–1706). Tensions between the constitutional Catalan institutions and the gradually more centralized Monarchy began to arise.[51] In 1626 the Count-Duke of Olivares, minister of Philip IV, tried to establish the military contribution of the states of the Monarchy, the Unión de Armas (Union of Arms),[52] but the resistance of Catalonia to the project was strong. This events, alongside other factors such as the economic crisis, the presence of soldiers and the peasants' revolts led to the Reapers' War, also called Catalan Revolt (1640–1652), in the context of the Franco-Spanish War, in which Catalonia, led by the president of the Generalitat, Pau Claris, briefly declared itself as an independent republic under French protection in January 1641, and later joined the Monarchy of France, appointing king Louis XIII as count of Barcelona,[53] but, after the first military successes the Catalans were finally defeated and reincorporated into the Crown of Spain in 1652.[54]

In 1659, after the Treaty of the Pyrenees signed by Philip IV of Spain, the comarques (counties) of Roussillon, Conflent, Vallespir and part of la Cerdanya, now known as French Cerdagne, were ceded to France.[55] In recent times, this area has come to be known by nationalist political parties in Catalonia as Northern Catalonia (Roussillon in French), part of the Catalan-spoken territories known as Catalan Countries. Catalan institutions were suppressed in this part of the territory and, in 1700, public use of Catalan language was prohibited.[56] Currently, this region is administratively part of French Départment of Pyrénées-Orientales.

In the last decades of the 17th century during the reign of Spain's last Habsburg king, Charles II, despite intermittent conflict between Spain and France and new internal conflicts like the Revolt of the Barretines (1687-1689), the population increased to approximately 500.000 inhabitants[57] and the Catalan economy recovered. This economic growth was boosted by the export of wine to England and the Dutch Republic, as due to the trade war of French minister Jean-Baptiste Colbert against the Dutch and later to the participation of these countries in the Nine Years' War against France were not able to trade with the French. This new situation caused many Catalans to look to England and, especially, the Netherlands as political and economic models for Catalonia.[58]

At the dawn of the War of the Spanish Succession, the Bourbon Duke of Anjou claimed the throne of Spain as Philip V, and the Principality initially supported his claim. However, repressive mesures of the viceroy Francisco de Velasco and authoritarian decisions of the king (some of them contrary to Catalan legislation), as well the economic policy and distrust to the French absolutism provoked that Catalonia to change sides in 1705, when Habsburg candidate, the Archduke Charles of Austria (as Charles III of Spain) landed in Barcelona.[59] Previously, the same year, the Principality of Catalonia and the Kingdom of England signed the Treaty of Genoa, receiving the first one protection to its institutions and liberties, entering in the pro-Habsburg Grand Alliance. The Treaty of Utrecht (1713) put end to the war, and the allied armies withdrew from Catalonia which, nonetheless, remained fighting with its own army by decision of the States-General until the fall of Barcelona after a long siege on 11 September 1714. The victorious army of Philip V occupied the capital of Catalonia and (as happened to the kingdoms of Aragon and Valencia, also loyals to Charles) in 1716 the king enacted the Nueva Planta decrees. The decrees abolished the main Catalan institutions and laws (except the civil and mercantile laws), establishing absolutism as the new political system, and imposed the administrative use of Spanish language, progressively displacing Catalan.[60][61]

Fall of Barcelona, 11 September 1714

Apart from the abolition of the Catalan institutions, the Nueva Planta decrees ensured the imposition of the new abolutist system by reforming the Royal Audience of Catalonia, making it the highest governmental body of the Principality, absorbing many of the functions of the abolished institutions and becoming the instrument with which the Captain General of Catalonia, the supreme authority of the province (replacing the viceroy), appointed by the king, would govern.[62] The division in vegueries was replaced with Castilian corregimientos. So late as in the 18th and 19th centuries, despite the military occupation, the imposition of high new taxes[63] and the political economy of the House of Bourbon, the Catalonia under Spanish administration (now as a province) continued the process of proto-industrialization, relatively helped at the end of the century from the beginning of open commerce to America and protectionist policies enacted by the Spanish government (although the policy of Spanish government during those times changed many times between free trade and protectionism), consolidating the new economic growth model that was taking place in Catalonia since the end of the 17th century, becoming a center of Spain's industrialization; to this day, it remains one of the more industrialized parts of Spain, along with Madrid and the Basque Country. In 1833, by decree of minister Javier de Burgos, all of Spain was organized into provinces, included Catalonia, which was divided in four provinces without a common administration: Barcelona, Girona, Lleida and Tarragona.

On several occasions during the first third of the 20th century, Catalonia gained and lost varying degrees of autonomy, recovering the administrative unity in 1914, when the four Catalan provinces were authorized to create a commonwealth (Catalan: Mancomunitat)[64] and, after the proclamation of the Second Spanish Republic in 1931, the Generalitat was restored as an institution of self-government, but as in most regions of Spain, Catalan autonomy and culture were crushed to an unprecedented degree after the defeat of the Second Spanish Republic in the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939) which brought Francisco Franco to power. Public use of the Catalan language was again banned after a brief period of general recuperation.[65]

The Franco era ended with Franco's death in 1975; in the subsequent Spanish transition to democracy, Catalonia recovered political and cultural autonomy. It became one of the autonomous communities of Spain. In comparison, Northern Catalonia in France has no autonomy.

The Catalan Courts (parliament) in the 15th century, presided over by Ferdinand II of Aragon

Seal of the Deputation of the General or Generalitat of Catalonia, showing Saint George, the patron saint of this institution

• Cort General de Catalunya or Corts Catalanes (General Court of Catalonia or Catalan Courts): parliamentary body and main institution of the Principality, created during the 13th century. Summoned and presided by the king, it was composed by the three estates of the realm and approved the legislation and the economic donation to the crown. Also served as monarch's council and as the place where the king could administer justice.[72]
• Diputació del General or Generalitat de Catalunya (Deputation of the General or Generalitat of Catalonia): permanent council of deputes, created in 1359 by the Courts in order to collect the "taxes of the General",[73] and later gained political power and tasks of prosecutor, becoming the most relevant Catalan institution during the early modern age. It consisted of three deputies and three oïdors (auditors of accounts), there was one deputy and one oïdor by estate.[74]
• Consell de Cent de Barcelona (Council of One Hundred of Barcelona): institution of government of the city of Barcelona, created during the reign of James I. The municipal authority rested on five, later six, counselors (led by the Conseller en cap, Head Counselor) elected by a Council of hundred individuals (jurats).
• Reial Audiència i Reial Consell de Catalunya (Royal Audience and Royal Council of Catalonia): supreme court of justice of Catalonia and seat of the government. Its members were elected by the king, and it was presided by the Chancellor (Canceller) during the absence of the king and the viceroy.[75]
• Conferència dels Tres Comuns (Conference of the Three Commons): joint meeting of the most dynamic institutions of the Catalan constitutional system during the 17th and 18th centuries, the Deputation of the General, the Military Estate and the Council of One Hundred, in order to discuss the political problems of the Principality.
• Junta de Braços or Braços Generals (States-General): extraordinary council convened by the Generalitat, composed by the representatives of the Catalan Courts who at that time were in Barcelona. The Junta operated like the Courts, but it lacked formal legislative powers.[76]
• Tribunal de Contrafaccions (Court of Contraventions): court of justice established by the Courts of 1701–1702 in order to ensure the application of the constitutions, as well as solving and prosecuting any actions contrary to the Catalan legislation, including the ones performed by the king or his officers. Its members were elected in parity by the institutions of the land and the king. It represented an important advance in the guarantee of individual and civil rights, even in the European context.[77]

• Usatges de Barcelona (Usages of Barcelona): compilation of customs and legislation based on the Roman and Visigothic law of the County of Barcelona, applied in practice to the entire Principality, that form the basis for the Catalan constitutions.
• Constitucions de Catalunya (Catalan constitutions): laws promulgated by the king and approved by the Catalan Courts. They had pre-eminence over the other legal rules and could only be revoked by the Courts themselves.
• Capítols de Cort (Chapters of Court): laws promulgated by the Courts and approved by the king.
• Actes de Cort (Acts of Court): minor legislative and other rules and decrees promulgated by the Courts, which didn't need the formal approval of the king.

• Lloctinent or Virrei de Catalunya (Lieutenant or Viceroy of Catalonia): representative of the king in the Principality from the 15th to the 18th centuries. As the alter nos of the monarch, he received the same treatment and honours.[78] Catalan constitutions allowed to appoint non-Catalans as vicerois.
• Portantveus de General Governador: highest official of the ordinary royal administration. The main reponsabilites comprised the administration of justice throughout the territory. Legally, when the king died, he assumed the royal faculties and replaced the viceroy, an event known as vice regia, until the new king swore the constitutions.[79]
• Batlle General de Catalunya
• Mestre Racional: royal official who was in charge of the accounting of the Principality. There were one Mestre in every realm of the Crown of Aragon. He recorded the accounts indicating the expenses and income of the royal patrimony. The Mestre Racional of the Principality of Catalonia also had jurisdiction over the kingdoms of Majorca and Sardinia.

Vegueries of Catalonia in 1304. Yellow and brown territories were lordships without a veguer

The vegueria was a territorial organization of Catalonia headed by a veguer (Latin: vigerius). The origins of the vegueria go back to the era of the Carolingian Empire, when vicars (Latin: vicarii, singular vicarius) were installed beneath the counts in the Marca Hispanica. The office of a vicar was a vicariate (Latin: vicariatus) and his territory was a vicaria. All these Latin terms of Carolingian administration evolved in the Catalan language.

The veguer was appointed by the king and was accountable to him. He was the military commander of his vegueria (and thus keeper of the publicly owned castles), the chief justice of the same district, and the man in charge of the public finances (the fisc) of the region entrusted to him. As time wore on, the functions of the veguer became more and more judicial in nature. He held a cort (court) del veguer or de la vegueria with its own seal. The cort had authority in all matter save those relating to the feudal aristocracy. It commonly heard pleas of the crown, civil, and criminal cases. The veguer did, however, retain some military functions as well: he was the commander of the militia and the superintendent of royal castles. His job was law and order and the maintenance of the king's peace: in many respects an office analogous to that of the sheriff in England.

Some of the larger vegueries included one or more sotsvegueries (subvigueries), which had a large degree of autonomy. At the end of the 12th century in Catalonia, there were 12 vegueries. By the end of the reign of Peter the Great (1285) there were 17, and by the time of James the Just, there were 21. After the French annexion of the vegueries of Perpignan and Vilafranca de Conflent in 1659, Catalonia retained a division of 15 vegueries, 9 sotsvegueries and the special district of the Val d'Aran. These administrative divisions remained until 1716 when they were replaced by the Castilian corregimientos.[80]