I. THE KING'S PREFACE.

My Lord Saint James declares that Faith without works is dead; our Lord wills that that saying be fulfilled as to our deeds: and though Faith without works be worth nothing, when both are joined they bear fruit which God will receive in His mansion. And although it was that the beginning of our birth was good, yet improvement was needed by our works; not that there was not faith in us to believe in our Creator and His works, and to pray His mother that she should pray for us to her dear Son, to forgive us our sins towards Him : wherefore for the faith we had, He leads us to true salvation. And as our Lord Jesus Christ, who knows all things, knew that our life would be prolonged so that we should make addition of good works to [2] the faith we had, He did us so much grace and mercy that, sinners though we were, both in mortal and in venial sins, He would not that we should come to evil or harm to our shame either in court or elsewhere ; neither would He that we should die till we had fulfilled our task.⁽¹⁾ And the grace He did us was such that He ever procured us honour from our enemies in deed and word, and gave us in our life health in body; if sometimes He sent us maladies, He did it by way of chastisement, like a father who chastises his son; for Solomon says that he who withholds from his son the rods of chastisement does him hurt, and it appears not that he loves him well. And yet our Lord did not chastise us so strongly that He did us hurt, wherefore we thanked Him when He chastised us, and more now, when we see that He did it for our good. And we remember well a saying that Holy Scripture declares, which says, "Omnis laus in fine canitur;" meaning this, that the best praise that a man can have is that at the last of his days. And the grace of the Lord of Glory has done to us in such wise that the word of Saint James is fulfilled : at the last of our days He brought it to pass that the work befitted our faith. And we, regarding and considering what this world is, in which men live after their fashion, [3] and how small and short this life is, and how weak and full of scandal, and how the other life has glory without end, and how our Lord gives it to those who desire it and pursue it; considering also how great is His power, and how weak and little we all are; knowing and understanding fully that true saying of Scripture, "Omnia pretereunt preter amare Deum," which means that all the things of this world pass away and are lost, save only the love of God; knowing also that that is truth and the rest a lie, we turned our thoughts and gave our works to do the commandments of our Saviour, and left the vain glories of this world that we might attain to His kingdom; for He says in the Gospel, "Qui vult venire post me, abneget seipsum, et tollat crucem suam et sequatur me," which means in our vernacular tongue, that who will follow Him, must leave his own will for His. Again, we remembering the great favours that He many a time has done us in the course of our life, and especially at the last of our days, determined to leave our will for His. And that men may know when we have passed from this mortal life, what we have achieved by the help of the powerful Lord, in whom is true Trinity, we leave this book for a memorial to those who desire to hear of the favours our Lord did us, and for an example to all the other men of the world that they may do what we have done, that is put their faith in that Lord who is so powerful. [4]

II.

True thing and certain is it that my grandfather, Don Alfonso [of Aragon],⁽²⁾ treated of a marriage alliance to the Emperor of Constantinople, whose name was Manuel;⁽³⁾ that the said Emperor should give him his daughter⁽⁴⁾ to wife. And while parley and treaties and agreements were in hand between the two, that is, between our grandfather and the Emperor, our grandfather [Don Alfonso] made a marriage with Queen Doña Sancha, who was a daughter of the Emperor of Castille.⁽⁵⁾ The Emperor of Constantinople, not knowing of this marriage, sent his daughter to King Don Alfonso of Aragon, who was [also] Count of Barcelona and Marquis of Provence. A bishop and two nobles who came with her, when they got to Montpellier, learned that our grandfather, King Don Alfonso, had taken to wife Queen Dona Sancha, the daughter of the Emperor of Castille. They saw themselves in great embarrassment and in great doubt as to what to do, since he (the King) had already taken [5] another wife. At this time En Guillen was Lord of Montpellier, and the surrounding territory. The nobles who had come with the Emperor's daughter asked him what they should do after this deceit and disappointment that had befallen them; they had come to Montpellier with the daughter of the Emperor Manuel to have her married to King Don Alfonso, and he [the King] had taken another wife! They asked him to advise them how they should act in the emergency. En Guillen de Montpellier replied that he would take counsel on it. When, therefore, he had assembled his Council, all the nobles, the knights, and the men of wealth and importance in the city advised him to keep her for his wife. Since God had done him that grace, that the daughter of the Emperor Manuel (at that time the first man among Christians) had come to the city and place where he actually was, and she (the daughter) had been disappointed of the husband she was to have; he, En Guillen, should take her to wife, and not let her go back [to Constantinople] on any account. Thereupon En Guillen framed his reply to the bishop and the nobles who came with her ; and the reply which he sent them by his messengers was to this effect: that since God had done him that grace, that the Emperor's daughter should come to Montpellier, and there learn that she was not to have the husband she should have had, he himself would take her to wife. When [6] the Emperor's envoys heard this message, the discomfort and sorrow they had at first experienced was increased twofold, that the Emperor's daughter should take a husband who was not a King nor an Emperor; for no other man was fit for her. They, therefore, prayed him very earnestly, for his own worthiness and for God's sake, to let the Emperor's daughter go back to Constantinople, for they had promised that if the marriage were not made they would take her back to her father by land or by sea ; and not to hinder them in that, for there was no just cause to do it, and she had not come there for him. Thereon En Guillen de Montpellier and his Council answered them : That it should be no otherwise.

When the Emperor's envoys perceived this their will and determination, and that it would not be otherwise, they asked for time to consider the matter; they were allowed till next day. Whereupon the bishops and nobles who had come with her, seeing that the will of En Guillen de Montpellier, and of his Council, would ultimately prevail, they thought that they would make the marriage with this condition: that if there was a son or a daughter, begotten of En Guillen de Montpellier and the Emperor's daughter, and he or she should survive, he or she should be Lord of Montpellier. They therefore went back with this answer, and told Guillen de Montpellier and his Council that [7] they might do them hurt, or imprison them, or take her from them, but neither with their will nor with hers would they make that marriage except in this wise: That he (En Guillen), should promise them on oath and doing homage,⁽⁶⁾ and all the men of Montpellier of ten years and upwards should also swear to it, that any son or daughter that might be born of the said marriage, should be Lord of Montpellier, whether a man or a woman. These terms were put down in writing, whereupon En Guillen de Montpellier, having first taken counsel of his nobles and of his Council, granted the terms, and thus was the marriage made. And En Guillen de Montpellier had by that lady a daughter named Mary.⁽⁷⁾

III.

And in after time there was a treaty of marriage between my father, King Don Pedro,⁽⁸⁾ and the daughter of En Guillen de Montpellier, who was Lady of that city and of all its appurtenances, it being stipulated that she should give [8] herself and Montpellier and all its appurtenances. And so was the marriage made, and her title increased, for she was henceforward called Queen Dona Maria.

IV.

And then En Guillen de Montpellier, she living, took another lady, who was from Castille. The name of the father of that lady I do not remember, but she was called Dona Inés (Agnes), by whom the Count had that son, En⁽⁹⁾ Guillen de Montpellier, who held Peyrolla⁽¹⁰⁾ till the hour of his death, and another, En Burgunyo, and En Bernard Guillen, to whom I gave a heritage and a wife, by name Na Juliana, by descent from the mother of the name of Entença, daughter of En Pons Huc, brother of the Count of Ampurias, whose name was Huch, and one other brother whom my father brought up, whose name was Tortoseta. And that Guillen de Montpellier, the eldest son of En Guillen de Montpellier, pretended to become Lord of Montpellier, because he was a man. And contention came before the Pope, so that our mother, the Queen Doña Maria, had to travel to the court of Rome to maintain her [9] rights, and demand that I, who was her heir, might be Lord of Montpellier. And Doña Maria's claim was contested before the Pope till His Holiness sentenced in her favour, as is written in a Decretal, and declared the children of En Guillen de Montpellier and of Na Inés (Agnes) not to be born in lawful wedlock, since they were begotten in adultery, he (En Guillen) having another wife at the time. Montpellier and its country was, therefore, adjudged to Queen Doña Maria, and to me, who was her son.

V.

Now I will relate in what wise I was begotten, and how my birth was. Firstly, in what manner I was begotten. Our father, King En Pedro, would not see our mother, the Queen, and it chanced that once the King, our father, was in Lates, and the Queen, our mother, in Miravals: and a nobleman, by name En Guillen Dalcalá, came to the King, and besought him till he made him go to Miravals, where the Queen, my mother, was. And that night that both were together at Miravals, it was the will of our Lord that I should be begotten. And when the Queen, my mother, perceived that she was with child, she and my father went to Montpellier. And thus it was the will of our Lord that my birth should be in the [10] house of the Tornamira, the eve of our Lady Saint Mary, Candlemas day.⁽¹¹⁾ And my mother, as soon as I was born, sent me to Saint Mary's; they carried me in their arms ; matins were being said in Our Lady's church, and as they took me through the porch they sang Te Deum Laudamus. The clergy did not notice the arrival of those who carried me, as when they entered they were singing that canticle. And then I was taken to Saint Fermin, and when those who carried me entered the church the priests were singing Benedictus Dominus Deus Israel. And when they took me back to my mother's house, she was very glad because of those prognostics that had happened. And she made twelve candles all of one weight and one size, and had them lighted all together, and gave each of them the name of an Apostle, and vowed to our Lord that I should be christened by the name of that which lasted longest. And so it happened that the candle that went by the name of Saint James lasted a good three fingers' breadth more than all the others. And owing to that circumstance, and to the grace of God I was christened "En Jacme." And thus am I descended on the side of my mother and that of King En Pere, my father. All this seemed the work of [11] God; for the agreement which our grandfather made to marry the Emperor's daughter was virtually carried out by the marriage of the descendants of that Emperor and of my father, King En Pere, and the breach of promise of the former marriage was thus repaired. And after this, as I lay in the cradle, there dropped through a trap-door over my head a great stone which fell close to the cradle; but it was our Lord's will to save me from certain death.⁽¹²⁾ [12]

VI.

My father, the King En Pere, was the most bounteous king there ever was in Spain, the most courteous and the most gracious, so that he gave [13] away much treasure, through which his revenue and lands were diminished. He was a good man at arms, as good as any in the world. Of his other good qualities I will not speak, not to lengthen this writing.

VII.

Of the Queen Doña Maria, my mother, I will say thus much, that if there was a good woman in the world it was she, in honouring and in fearing God and in other good ways that in her were. And much good could I say of her; but let me sum up by stating that she was beloved by all who knew her good qualities ; that our Lord loved her so, and gave her such grace, that she is called the Holy Queen, not only at Rome, where she died, but all over the world besides. Many sick are to this day cured by drinking in water or in wine the dust scraped from her tombstone in the church of Saint Peter at Rome, near Saint Petronilla, the [14] daughter of Saint Peter. And look ye who peruse this writing. Is it not a miraculous thing that my grandfather, King Don Alfonso, promised that the Emperor's daughter should be his wife, and yet he took afterwards Queen Doña Sancha ? And it was the will of Our Lord that that promise that the King had made first, that is, that the daughter of the Emperor Manuel should be his wife, should come round, that it ended in that the granddaughter of the Emperor Manuel was afterwards wife of our father, of whom I myself came. And thus it was the work of God that that agreement which was not completed in that time was fulfilled afterwards, when my father took to wife the granddaughter of the Emperor.

VIII.

And after my birth, En Simon de Montfort, who had the land of Carcassonne and Badarres,⁽¹³⁾ and of Toulouse, what the King of France had conquered, desired to have friendship with my father, and asked for me, that he might bring me up at his court. And my father trusted so much in Montfort and in his friendship, that he delivered me to him to bring up.⁽¹⁴⁾ And being in [15] his (Montfort's) power, the people of the above-named countries came to my father and said to him that he might well become the lord of those countries, if he would only occupy them. And King En Pere, my father, was liberal and compassionate, and for the pity that he had of the deputies, said that he would take possession; but they deceived him with fair words, for if on one hand they gave him promises, on the other they were deficient in deeds. And I afterwards heard it said by En Guillen de Cervera, and Arnau de Castellbó, and En Dalmau de Crexel, and others, who were then with my father, that the deputies said to him, "My lord, here are our castles and our towns ; take possession of them, and put your own officers (batles) in them." And when my father was about to take possession of the land they said, "My lord, how will you turn our wives out of our houses? We and they will be yours ; we will doy our will." But they did nothing they had promised him. And they showed him their wives and their daughters, and their kinswomen, the fairest they could find; but when they knew that he was a woman's man, they took away his good thoughts, and turned them to what they wished.⁽¹⁵⁾ However, as it would take me too long a time to relate those things, I will pass on to more important matters.

1. Here the original has the word aço, which means "thus" or "in this manner."

2. Alfonso II., el Casto, or the Chaste, King of Aragon from 1172 to 1196.

3. Emmanuel Comnene, from 1143 to 1180.

4. Eudoxia.

5. That is Alfonso VIII. of Castille, born in 1106 ; he married, in 1128, Berenguela, or Berengère, daughter of Raimon Berenguer, Count of Barcelona. His daughter (Sancha) was married in 1174 to Alfonso II. of Aragon.

6. "Ab sagrament e ab homenatge," says the text.

7. This account of the marriage of William of Montpellier, in 1174, with Eudoxia, the daughter of the Emperor of Constantinople, Emmanuel Comnenus, is accepted by history. - Hist. du Languedoc, tom iii. p. 376, tom. iv. p. 263, and Zurita, Anales de Aragon, lib. ii. cap. 33 and 54.

8. Pedro II. of Aragon, son of Alfonso and Sancha, and father of Jacme or James. He was born in 1176, became king in 1196, and died in 1213. He was married in 1204 to Maria of Montpellier, who died in 1214.

9. En is equivalent to Don in Spanish, and was always prefixed to the proper names of nobles Catalonia. Ena 6 Na being used for the ladies.

10. Peyrolla says the text, but it in must be a misprint for Peyolla, as in the Spanish translation.

11. From the various dates mentioned in the chronicles, and from other authentic sources, the birth of James must be assigned to the 1st of February, 1208.

12. The marriage of Guillen, or Guillaume de Montpellier, with Eudoxia, daughter of Manuel Comnenus, Emperor of the East, was in 1174; and the account given in explanation of it in the text is accepted by historians. Only one child, Maria de Montpellier, was born of it, about 1182 (she stated herself in 1197 to be upwards of fifteen years old). No cause but the want of a male heir was avowed by Guillaume for driving away his wife, in 1187, and entering into a pretended marriage with one Agnes, of whom it seems known only that she was of the royal house of Aragon. (Histoire du Languedoc, t. v., p. 534.) His marriage contract with her appears to make no mention of his previous marriage, and declares that this was for the sake of male issue (amore procreandorum filiorum, Hist. Lang., t. iv. p. 115). Having two sons by his new companion, he extorted from his daughter Maria a renunciation of her inheritance of Montpellier, on marrying her to Barral, Count of Marseilles ; this must have been when she was not ten years old, for her husband died in 1192. His death seems to have been considered as annulling her renunciation ; and her father forced on her another marriage, in 1197, with Bernard, Count of Comminges, when another renunciation was made by her, in favour of her two half-brothers successively ; she being therein made to declare emphatically that she made it knowingly, being more than fifteen years old. (Hist. Lang. t. v. p. 59.) Two daughters were born of this marriage, within two years; but within that time also strife arose between husband and wife. Bernard, after failing in an application for a divorce, so treated his wife that she fled to her father, in 1200. (Hist. Lang. t. v. p. 69.)

Guillaume de Montpellier died in 1202, after in vain urging [12] Innocent III to declare legitimate his sons by Agnes (Innocent III. Epist. lib. v. ep. 128): a measure without which Maria's renunciation in their favour was of no avail. She thus became the lawful Lady of Montpellier, and as such Pedro II desired to marry her. Through his brother-in-law, the Count of Toulouse, he promoted the Count of Comminges' repudiation of her, on the ground that when he married her there were living two ladies with whom he had gone through the ceremony of marriage as well as on the usual pretext of affinity; and in 1204 the King became Maria de Montpellier's third husband, and, consequently, stepfather of her two daughters.

A daughter, Sancha, was born to them in the next year ; but Maria, in this marriage, was as unhappy as before. Pedro II. (whose conduct was licentious, even for that age) ceased to live with her, and his aversion was such, that an especial representation of the importance to Aragon of a male heir was necessary to restore a temporary union, such as was brought about by a knight of the name of Alcalá. But even the birth (2d February 1208) of the desired son did not restore peace to their household. Pedro instituted a suit for nullity of marriage against the Queen, alleging that that between her and the Count de Comminges was a valid marriage after all; she went to Rome to plead her own cause.

On the 19th February, 1213, Innocent III. decided it in her favour, giving reasons for holding that she had not been duly married to the Count de Comminges, and commanding the King to take her back to his hearth ; but she lived only a few weeks longer, dying at Rome in April following. (Innocent III. Epist. lib. xv. ep. 221 ; Hist. Lang. t. v. pp. 207- 209.)

The statement that a daughter, Sancha, was born to Pedro and Maria in the year after their marriage, rests on the authority of a treaty between the King and Raymond VI., Count of Toulouse, betrothing her, with Montpellier as her dowry, to the Count's son, afterwards Raymond VII. (Hist. Lang. t. v. p. 89.) But other documents show that Raymond VIII., [13] in 1211, married another Sancha, the sister of Pedro II., from whom he separated in 1230, and whom he formally repudiated in 1241 (Hist. Lang. t. vi. p. 328.) And, besides, the present history of King James makes him solemnly declare, in a speech in Cortes (fol. xviii.), that his father and mother had no child but him.

The historians of Languedoc reconcile the conflicting documents under their eyes (the King's own declaration not being among them), by supposing the Sancha, Pedro II.'s daughter, to have died young; to which must be added the supposition that she died so mere an infant that even King James had lost sight of her existence, which is not wholly improbable.

13. Bedarrieux (Biterre) in the county of Béziers.

14. Zurita, Anales, II. c. 63, explains this, by stating that Simon de Montfort was to marry his daughter and heiress to the young prince Jacme.

15. "Com gitarets nostres mullers de nostres cases, mes nos e eles ne seren vostres, en faren vostra volentat. E per aquesta manera noli atenyen ço que li prometien, e mostrauen li llurs mullers, e llurs filles, e llurs parentes les plus belles que podien trobar. E can sabien que ell era horn de fembres tolien li son bon proposit, e feyan lo mudar en ço que ells volien.”