[17] Evaluation of the elements involved in reconstructing a rawly conquered kingdom and in molding it into startlingly different cultural shapes should begin with the cathedral. As the parish was the cell of the ecclesiastical body, the bishop in his cathedral was its heart and its head. The Valencian cathedral had to be the model and mother of the lesser churches. Her liturgical customs set the pattern throughout the diocese; her synods promulgated general laws; her bishop was the source of jurisdiction and the wielder of corrective powers. In the newly conquered land it was the bishop's responsibility to plant the parishes effectively, fighting the while to preserve their revenues and the powers proper to his see.

The Cathedral, Hub of the Diocese

The bishop must foster education, examine teachers, force upon lawbreakers the Peace and Truce of God, put down clerical abuses, erect a professional legal system, arbitrate quarrels without number, wage disturbingly expensive lawsuits over diocesan rights, dedicate churches, confirm, make records, cope with a great flow of correspondence, slyly expand the limits of his diocese when claim and opportunity coincided, persuade a reluctant people to pay tithes, and rebuke impiety. The list is well-nigh inexhaustible, even if all mention of military, political, and seignorial activities is omitted. In fact, the contemporary Catalan canonist Raymond of Penyafort, after a brave effort to survey even the major spiritual tasks of a bishop in his day, abandons the list as involving "many other duties which it would be difficult to enumerate, because his is the pre-eminent government in all things [spiritual]."⁽¹⁾

Episcopal courts tried the civil or criminal cases involving tonsured clerics (a sizable percentage of the population), and much that involved crusaders, orphans, widows, pilgrims, and students. These courts could also claim jurisdiction over the general populace for cases concerning tithes; for offenses done in holy places; for litigation involving an oath -- an extensive field in medieval society; and for adultery, heresy, usury, and the like. In Valencia, the bishop was the equal of the greatest magnates. In Catalan lands generally, far more than in Castile or Portugal, the local bishop had long [18] been a power in urban and secular affairs.⁽²⁾ The bishop of Valencia was also the most important ecclesiastical figure in the corts or parliament of the kingdom of Valencia, along with the bishops of Segorbe and Tortosa, the masters of the Temple and Hospital, and the abbots of Benifasá and Valldigna.⁽³⁾ And as a social force in Valencia the bishop had no peer except the king.

In the early days of the Valencian diocese, there would be fatiguing verbal skirmishes with king, nobles, and townsmen; determined conflicts to repel the bishops nibbling at his borderlands; intramural tussles with chapter and archdeacon; occasional legal-diplomatic sallies to Rome; and a fine battle royal with the primate of Toledo. The religious Orders particularly roused all that was bellicose in a Valencian bishop. To the conservative churchman the whole ecclesiastical order seemed to be turned upside down by the unprecedented spread and influence of the Mendicants and other activist religious Orders. The status of exemption from episcopal control in much of their activity was provoking, as was their remarkable success as preachers, teachers, and confessors. The jurisdictional and financial aspects of this success became the focus of myriad local squabbles, culminating in a bitter "polémica universal" throughout Europe during this period.⁽⁴⁾

Taken all in all, the Valencian bishop was to have a lively time of it facing up to his many opponents. The list of episcopal battles is long and the trend of the fighting sometimes obscure. Enough material survives to assure us that, unless the man were pugnacious by nature, a Valencian bishop's lot was vexatious enough. Considering all this and throwing onto the balance the properly spiritual obligations and even those exacting civil duties imposed by the king (two of the bishops concerned were royal chancellors), it is surprising that progress in the diocese was not more halting.

What the parish did in a local way to impose new shapes and meaning on its environment, the cathedral achieved in a larger and more comprehensive form. There was a preoccupation, perhaps not unconnected with the prescriptions of the Old Testament, to have an imposing and richly fashioned central cathedral. Here the splendors of the liturgy could be offered continually to God, by a properly numerous gathering of distinguished clerics. Over Europe at this time some fifty cathedrals or equivalently large churches were being raised including Beauvais, Westminster Abbey, Strasbourg, and Cologne. In Valencia as elsewhere contemporary custom dictated many of the details. In these the new diocese was anxious not to appear inferior to her elders; a dash of rivalry spiced her efforts.

"The church of Our Lady St. Mary" was for some time the adapted central mosque, to which all the Moslems of Valencia city had been obliged to come on Fridays.⁽⁵⁾ Its altars and furnishings now offered an odd contrast to the Koranic texts sculptured upon its chaste walls. This mosque-as-church would probably have covered the area presently filled by the cathedral sanctuary [19] and apse, with the flanking chapels and sacristy; most of the choir may have stood on part of the court of ablutions. A bull of Gregory IX, on October 9, 1239, elevated this converted mosque to the status of a cathedral.⁽⁶⁾ But it could hardly answer as symbol and center for a diocese so uncomfortably immersed in a sea of Moslems Something more imposing, more aggressively Christian, was required.

It must also be comfortably large, since it was to be the scene of many an elaborate public function. In civil life the cathedral would house the occasional meeting of the Valencian parliament,⁽⁷⁾ the annual inauguration to civic office,⁽⁸⁾ and the royal solemnities when James proclaimed in Valencia the expulsion of the Moslems.⁽⁹⁾ Its great bell sounded out in times of crisis; this alerted the citizens when fire broke out, and brought them running with weapons in hand when police action was required. ⁽¹⁰⁾

To stage the spiritual and secular solemnities the Valencians planned a Romanesque cathedral. They saw the first stone laid on June 22, 1262.⁽¹¹⁾ Elements of the Gothic style were incorporated and very soon took over the dominant role. But Bishop Andrew, the well-traveled Dominican who inaugurated the work, failed to choose a French architect. Here, then, since Aragonese Gothic was not so advanced as Castilian, there would be no Burgos or León or Toledo cathedral, all of which were under construction. On the other hand, there would be no regression of Gothic influence in face of an upsurging Mudejar art, as happened in the contemporary Castilian conquest. In art, the spirit of the north persisted tenaciously.⁽¹²⁾

The forward portion of the church went up first, the nave continuing later as finances allowed; by the early fourteenth century the whole structure had assumed the same extension it has today. The floor plan is a Latin cross with very short nave. The principal nave stands out boldly, the collateral ones being narrow; small chapels cluster all around the semicircular apse or head of this cross. The low vault and wide arcades, among other elements, recall Italian churches like Santa Maria Novella at Florence.

A troop of wandering craftsmen, under "the master of the works of the cathedral," had taken up the job. Nicholas of Autun later became the second master, chosen by bishop and chapter in 1303 to direct construction, pictures, and all details at a life-contract guaranteeing board plus two and one-half solidi a day. To keep the circuit around the cathedral uncluttered -- probably as much for dignity of appearance as for church processions -- King James as early as 1249 had forbidden the encircling houses to build any portico, arcade, porch, overhang, connecting bridge, "or any kind of closure."⁽¹³⁾

Of the first building operations, one strikingly beautiful Romanesque doorway still remains. It seems to be the work of Lérida craftsmen, and provides evidence for those who see a special relation between the cathedrals (and the peoples) of Lérida and frontier Valencia. A companion portal [20] surviving from the thirteenth century is the Gothic, exquisitely carved Door of the Apostles, begun by Bishop Jazpert about 1276; this served for the bishop's processional entrance just as a previous door here had served for the mosque entry.⁽¹⁴⁾ In those early days the ground plan was much less ambitious; the whole building was on high ground, boasted a meandering cemetery hard by, and enjoyed rather more space around it.

In 1334 daring new plans were to incorporate the construction already achieved; a new cornerstone went down, and the cathedral began to expand to its modern proportions. The Gothic lines of later portions are visible today, since a good part of the plaster-cum-gilt, rococo interior masking it was mercifully knocked away during the last civil war. The dark interior, much larger than Bishop Andrew had planned, fails to convey any feeling of spaciousness or aspiration; still, seen for itself, as a huge edifice regular and ample, it is an achievement.

Even while the cathedral had been located in the mosque, a special privilege was sought and won from Pope Alexander IV (1257) allowing forty days' indulgence to those who, at the four great festivities of the Virgin, should visit the "church of Valencia established in honor of Blessed Mary the Virgin."⁽¹⁵⁾

Some fifteen benefices or chantries were secured for the cathedral during the organizational era of the diocese. A year after the conquest Peter Melet instituted one of the first, named in honor of St. Vincent (1240). King James followed with the benefice of St. James (1245). Others soon came from: James Sanz (1247), the cathedral precentor (1250), the archdeacon Martin of Entenza (two in 1252), the canon Bertrand of Teruel (1256), the canon William of Arenys (1267), the dean James Sarroca (1270), Berengar of Ciutadella (1272), the canon Vincent of St. Vincent (1272), the canon Nicholas of Hungary (1274), the canon Peter Pérez of Tarragona (1279), Raymond of Cardona (1281), and so on. The invocations for these varied: Vincent, James, Holy Spirit, Anthony, Matthew, Augustine, Margaret, Crown of Thorns, Lucy, Blaise, Benedict, Mary Magdalene, and Luke. The donor and his heirs retained the patronage.⁽¹⁶⁾

The formula for endowment followed that of a sale. It involved a perpetual patronage with right of presentation -- or perhaps one may think of it as a benefice with right to propose a vicar:

We [bishop and chapter] sell to you, William of Arenys canon of Valencia, the fruits of one prebend, which shall daily yield twelve pence in Valencian money. And we promise, in the matter of your heirs and successors, that the right of patronage will come to you and yours, with or without a last testament. [We will] provide perpetually without any obstacle an issue of twelve pence to one priest, who daily is to celebrate Mass in our church for the soul of yourself and your relatives.⁽¹⁷⁾

The bishops resident may often have been traveling; no visitation records survive to check on this. However, they would surely not have wandered like the vagabond English bishops, because their support apparently lay not so much in far-flung manors as in tithes, which were gathered by officials into central depots and cellars for marketing.⁽¹⁸⁾ Despite their loud outcries, the financial position of the bishops seems to have been relatively enviable. In any case, a bishop's residence in those days was a center of authority "far more stable than that of the king and his agents" who were forever on the move.⁽¹⁹⁾ When at home, the bishop lived in a "palace" to the right of the cathedral.⁽²⁰⁾ This was probably nothing majestic. At first it would have been a complex of buildings converted from secular uses. The bishop may have acquired them in the multiple purchases of houses fronting on the cathedral in 1242.⁽²¹⁾ An important settlement between clergy and Knights Hospitallers in 1255 was signed "in the houses of the bishop." A similar document has the singular "house."⁽²²⁾

A bishop's household of this period might be expected to include a legal staff -- Official, penitentiary, advocates, and the like with their clerks; an ecclesiastical staff, especially a chaplain and a theologian; and a secretarial staff -- accountants, auditors, estate stewards, and bailiffs. Peter Savior "notary of the lord bishop" appears in action as early as June 1240.⁽²³⁾ A legal staff for the bishop of Valencia handled trials for usury, sacrilege, blasphemy, assault on clerics, marriage problems, and "similar" cases.⁽²⁴⁾

The "Official of the Lord Bishop of Valencia," a delegate and judicial substitute for the bishop, appears almost from the beginning but formally from 1243.⁽²⁵⁾ He is named in 1263, when the Hospitallers appeal from him to the pope; in a tithe document of 1272; when he is interfering at St. Vincent's in 1284; and again in 1284 when a parent asks him to protect his son, a fugitive Dominican, from forcible return.⁽²⁶⁾ The penitentiary, who exercised jurisdiction over confessional or other cases "reserved" to the bishop, turns up in documents of 1241 and 1242. He had been one of the first functionaries appointed however as early as 1238. The office was then held by Matthew of Oteiza, archpriest of Teruel and canon of Valencia.⁽²⁷⁾

These are only stray documents, giving no idea of the press of business which assailed the ecclesiastical courts in Valencia almost as soon as the city fell. One suitor was to recall going to court when the metropolitan was the acting authority in the city (1238-1239); "and he found there many litigants" already waiting, with a cleric busily hearing "all" the cases of the city. Another witness was to recall that the archbishop often appeared at this time to hear a run of cases personally; one day he watched him through two such cases involving clerics.⁽²⁸⁾

[22]As for the domestic staff, a chaplaincy was founded in 1260 under the invocation of St. Paul. But the palace already had possessed from 1243 a de facto resident chaplain. The "chaplaincy of the bishop's palace" and the "chaplain of the bishop's palace" are in the crusade tax lists of 1279 and 1280, paying the modest assessments of 22 and 24 solidi.⁽²⁹⁾ The bishop's bailiff appears a number of times in the records, though often he seems to be a transient tax farmer.⁽³⁰⁾ There is also an unspecified familiar in the records,⁽³¹⁾ and a "Master Bartholomew of Garleyn, physician of the said bishop."⁽³²⁾ The "six dining tables, one of which is round, and twelve benches and three sitting chairs" in the inventory of Bishop Arnold (1248) suggest a sizable staff or else great expectations of company.⁽³³⁾ Mixed into the same inventory, perhaps to dust the tables and wash the pots enumerated, is the bishop's slave, a Moslem woman.⁽³⁴⁾

All in all, the frontier bishops in Valencia succeeded in creating a fairly imposing central mechanism during the first sixty years. By the end of the century, when requesting a cardinal's hat for his realms, James II will not be ashamed to begin his list of the foremost suitable candidates with the name of the bishop of Valencia.⁽³⁵⁾

The Episcopate

A diocese reflects the man who rules it. An understanding of the evolving frontier church would not be complete without some examination of the individual bishops. They were five in all for this period, if we include the incumbent whose long reign began in the year James I died.⁽³⁶⁾ The first, who never passed beyond the status of "elect," was Berengar of Castellbisbal. He had taken part in both the Majorcan and Valencian crusades. As confessor and familiar of King James, he was a reliable man from the point of view of royal interest. He was also a Dominican friar of experience and spirituality. Vincke suggests indeed that James chose him for these latter gifts, with deliberate intent of making less reasonable the claims and interference of the Toledo metropolitan. There was no question at this date of direct, official intervention in the election of a bishop; still, the men favored by king and metropolitan would naturally have the strongest chances.

One of the crusaders, in testimony given at a trial shortly after the city's fall, recalled the election. The witness "saw how the said archbishop came out of the council he was at with his bishops, with the Franciscans, and with the Dominicans." To the observers standing there the metropolitan proclaimed: "We choose as bishop of Valencia Berengar of Castellbisbal." A few years later, losing the Valencian office during the jurisdictional wrangling between Toledo and Tarragona, Castellbisbal received instead the diocese of Gerona. He died in 1264.⁽³⁷⁾

Ferrer of Pallarés (1240-1243)⁽³⁸⁾ turns up as bishop-elect quite suddenly [23] in records of May and June 1240, apparently in full course as governor of the Valencian church.⁽³⁹⁾ The papal commission of April 1239 had reached a decision favorable to ownership of the diocese by the metropolitan of Toledo, only to have it appealed by Tarragona; this would account for Ferrer's consecration appearing in the cathedral constitutions under the date of June 22, 1240. However, he may have been consecrated in mid-October of that same year. Historians have expended a good deal of energy in useless speculation as to the implications of the words "elect" and "bishop" in his documents, but since the terms were interchangeable at this period, they prove nothing.⁽⁴⁰⁾ The exact date when Ferrer changed from administrative precursor to full bishop of Valencia cannot be ascertained.⁽⁴¹⁾

He certainly possessed administrative ability, in view of the important offices he exercised at Tarragona and which he retained during his incumbency as bishop of Valencia, and in view of his having previously been left in charge at Valencia by the metropolitan.⁽⁴²⁾ He was also, and the fact may be significant, a Catalan rather than an Aragonese. He had been at the king's side on a number of important occasions, acting as official witness to a treaty with Genoa (1230) and to the surrender of Minorca (1231).⁽⁴³⁾ As a warrior cleric he had led a sizable contingent, including a ship, on the Majorcan crusade.⁽⁴⁴⁾ The abundant rewards he received there indicate that his group had been prominent in the fighting. The organization of these properties, or other duties, apparently kept him from crusading in Valencia.⁽⁴⁵⁾ Like his predecessor, he was surely a personal choice of the king.⁽⁴⁶⁾

During his reign an episcopal household was organized; a practical compromise was reached by which the king paid an endowment sum; a considerable amount of rentals, sales, and exchanges of property was undertaken so as to stabilize the financial basis of the diocese; a sensible division of revenues was arranged (1240); some vigorous disputes were brought to a compromise; the diocese was divided into two archdeaconries; and a general regulation of the divine services was worked out (by 1242). Judging from this evidence, Ferrer seems to have been a man of ability, a man with important connections before his election, a man equally at home in the saddle or in the chancery. This was a happy combination of qualifications during the disorganized initial years of settlement, when strangers were coming into the realm from all sides to seek their fortunes.

One glimpse of his personality is not reassuring. He weakly allowed the king to absorb all the tithes and rentals on mosque properties, except for a third; that is, he signed away to the crown the bulk of the revenues which the infant church would need for proper growth.⁽⁴⁷⁾ It is quite possible that Bishop Ferrer was, though not a tool of the king, at least too subservient. After all, the canons who were first installed at the capital were the king's creatures, according to the complaint later brought by the chapter against James.⁽⁴⁸⁾ This fiscal action of Ferrer, perhaps only a desperate expedient, [24] inaugurated a long struggle between diocese and crown, concluded in favor of the former only in 1273.⁽⁴⁹⁾

On the other hand, St. Peter Nolasco cherished Ferrer as a friend. While the bishop was on his way to attend a provincial council at Barcelona, he was ambushed by a party of Moors in the badlands north of Tortosa and taken prisoner. Nolasco "was extremely grieved" to hear of this; he did his best to ransom the bishop. No time remained. After a three-day captivity, the first bishop of Valencia was "wickedly slain" (April 30, 1243). In view of his combat record and the rebellious state of the conquered country, there is little excuse for the local tendency to regard Bishop Ferrer as a martyr.⁽⁵⁰⁾

Arnold of Peralta (1243-1248) was unanimously elected to succeed him, the choice being that of six representatives designated by the Valencia chapter (June 1, 1243).⁽⁵¹⁾ Arnold was a hardheaded Aragonese, from a noble family of Ribagorza. He had previously held the very important position of archdeacon in the diocese of Lérida. His electors introduce him as a man decent and educated ("honestum, literatum"), discreet in affairs spiritual as well as temporal, and capable of defending the rights of the church. His five-year tenure as bishop of Valencia left a strong imprint on the young diocese, whose southern portions at the time of his accession had not yet been conquered. Two vigorous struggles now began whose clamor would continue to the subsequent reign. The first was a determined effort to recover from the crown the revenues Bishop Ferrer had signed away; Bishop Arnold may even have carried this fight to Rome.⁽⁵²⁾ The second battle was against the claims of Segorbe to be an independent diocese, a complicated episode which will be discussed in the next chapter.

Bishop Arnold continued the work of organizing the diocesan revenues, especially along the lines of converting real properties into rentals. He it was who first created twelve officials, the priors or prepositi, to oversee the collection of the capitular share of those revenues (1247).⁽⁵³⁾ In 1243 or 1244 he seems to have convoked the first diocesan synod, in the series of twelve Valencian synods during the thirteenth century.⁽⁵⁴⁾ Thus he began that work of applying discipline, so necessary to counterbalance the effects of ignorance, adventurous effervescence, and disparate traditions in the newly forming clerical body. He set the number of possible cathedral canons at twenty, created in 1248 the archdeaconry of newly conquered Játiva (1244), and promptly fell into a serious legal quarrel with Játiva over respective jurisdictions. The metropolitan finally had to be called in to settle this last difficulty.⁽⁵⁵⁾

Bishop Arnold continued on a large scale the regulative work of adjusting with each religious Order claims to revenues or jurisdiction. This last work was important in a young diocese which hoped to recruit skilled helpers from the local reserve of the religious. Thus the reign of Bishop Arnold [25] marks a second stage in the organization of the diocese. Without introducing novel policies, except for the firm opposition to the king's raid upon church revenues, Arnold pursued the aims of administrative centralization of authority, combined with specific delegation of that authority to diocesan officials. The rate of progress was definitely accelerated during these five short years.

Bishop Arnold was strangely unsatisfied with his position and soon asked to be transferred. An opportunity came in the summer of 1248; Arnold was removed to Zarogoza, the capital city of Aragon proper.⁽⁵⁶⁾ One may only guess as to his motives -- ambition, the interminable conflict with the neighboring diocese of Segorbe, or unhappiness over Moslem prerogatives. (He had been the major supporter of the king's proposal to exile the Moslems, or at least a substantial number of them.)⁽⁵⁷⁾ Perhaps, having backed the king so strongly on the Moslem question, and having proved so useful an ambassador to the pope when James had been excommunicated for cutting off part of Castellbisbal's tongue, Arnold was simply reaping the rewards accruing to those who befriend the powerful. Or, as an Aragonese he may have experienced a sense of friction in dealing with his Catalan co-workers and population. He left behind an interesting assortment of oddments for which an inventory was drawn.⁽⁵⁸⁾

The Dominican prior Andrew of Albalat (1248-1276), one of nine candidates proposed to the chapter, was elected third bishop of the diocese early in December 1248.⁽⁵⁹⁾ His was easily the most important of these early episcopates. It lasted almost thirty years (he was to die in 1276, the same year as King James), as against the previous episcopates of three and of five years. It was able to build too upon the foundations so carefully laid by its pioneer predecessors. The new bishop belonged to a prominent Catalan family. His brother was a celebrated bishop of Lérida and from 1238 to 1251 metropolitan at Tarragona for the realms of King James.⁽⁶⁰⁾ Andrew Albalat, as brother of this luminary, naturally went from grace to grace.

Bishop Andrew convened no less than eight diocesan synods: in 1255, 1258, 1261, 1262, 1263, 1268, 1269, and 1273. At these synods the constitutions which would govern and form the Valencian church were worked out. Uniformity of ritual, instruction of clergy, reform of easygoing frontier habits and of morals, rules for residence and for clerical life, and regulation of revenues constitute the major themes of these meetings. There is a particular concern for the sacraments of the church.

Bishop Andrew also captained the clerical forces in the tithe dispute which resounded in the kingdom until settled by the crown. He pursued the barons of the realm who refused to pay tithes in full; in this connection he succeeded in filing away many a formal contract which preserved at least the principle that these tithes belonged inalienably to the church. During his incumbency, [26] the great tithe settlement of 1268 was achieved.⁽⁶¹⁾ In June 1262 he laid the cornerstone for the Gothic cathedral, whose construction he encouraged and labored over. He took much trouble to found the monastery of Gate of Heaven (Porta Coeli) and to secure for it a settlement of those prayerful recluses the Carthusians.

During his reign all the parish mosques except one were pulled down and bright new Gothic structures substituted. Bishop Andrew made further changes in the system for gathering revenues, creating twelve new offices or priorates to help in this work, one for each month. This proved to be a clumsy device, destined to cause problems.⁽⁶²⁾ By an appeal to Pope Clement IV concerning the extreme poverty of his diocese, Bishop Andrew brought pressure on James to remedy that situation through tax provision and through gifts. Andrew also created the deanery and twelve canonries to augment the splendor of the cathedral liturgy. His surviving records are filled with property transactions and rentals. They include the expected measure of lawsuits and the usual adjustments of conflicting interests between the diocese and religious Orders. There are privileges like the right of asylum by the king, and special faculties from the pope to deal with confusions arising from the mingling of two religions here on the frontier.

Andrew grew in stature as a national figure. This must have reflected some prestige onto the young diocese. He became a confidant of King James, ambassador, chancellor of the realms with custody of the royal seal, and an agent for the crown at Rome. He was sent by the pope in 1258 to reform the Augustinian canons of Montearagón near Huesca. In 1263 he served on the commission which drew the Valencia-Castile boundary. In 1274 he attended the second ecumenical council of Christendom at Lyons. Shortly thereafter he acted as papal envoy to dissuade King Alphonse of Castile from his aspirations to the crown of the Holy Roman Empire. Journeying to Italy to report on this affair, he suddenly died at Viterbo (November 25, 1276).⁽⁶³⁾

The latter circumstance allowed the pope, by a canonical technicality, to appoint the next bishop of Valencia. A happy choice for the post was at that moment in Viterbo, one Jazpert of Botonach. He was a Catalan of noble family and of some reputation as a lawyer, who had already risen to be sacristan at the cathedral of his native Gerona as well as abbot of St. Felix. His episcopate (1276-1288) was to last thirteen years and was to consolidate the work of his predecessor, filling in the structural outlines and continuing the general policies. He was "a big, handsome, well-endowed, jovial, large-hearted individual," gifts which surely contributed to his success in this work.⁽⁶⁴⁾

He called diocesan synods in 1278 and 1280, and he refers in general to at least one previous synod. Jazpert created two more archdeaconries in 1279: Murviedro and Alcira, both near the capital. He added five canonries at the [27] cathedral; and he made a determined effort to clear up the remaining unpleasant quarrels concerning tithes and first fruits. Bishop Jazpert seems to have had unusual literary gifts; he is thought to be the author of one of the greatest medieval histories, the chronicle of Bernard Desclot. It was to him that Arnold of Vilanova dedicated in an introductory letter his De improbatione maleficiorum.

Jazpert was also a prominent adviser to the crown, more especially during the quarrel with the papacy and during the French crusade against Aragon. His counsel as to the juridical position to be assumed by the king of Aragon may have influenced Philip the Fair in his later conflict with Boniface VIII. When King Peter lay dying, "he called to his side the bishop [Jazpert] of Valencia, whom he loved much," and reminded him "that I have ever cherished thee at all times and that I have continually relied upon thee and have entrusted to thee many of my affairs and...thou didst guide me faithfully and well."⁽⁶⁵⁾

The last decade of the century was filled by his successor, also a papal appointee, the Dominican Raymond Deçpont (1289-1312). He was an important figure at Rome, both as a learned official of the pope and also as governor of the march of Ancona. He was equally important in the kingdom of Aragon where he was chancellor and an intimate of the king. As a diplomat making peace between France and Aragon, for example, or as one of the most active figures at the ecumenical council of Vienne he remained prominent in affairs of state. More to the point, he was a great-hearted priest devoted to his people. His revenues he turned to the service of the poor. He made the rounds of the city hospitals alone every week, in the early dawn, to console the sick and aid the poor. His synodal legislation includes a careful exposition on the sacraments. Raymond is perhaps the most attractive of all the interesting bishops of this century in Valencia. His story really lies just over the horizon and must serve only to put a border to our summary view of the pioneer episcopate.

All of the pioneer bishops of Valencia were able men, well suited to their responsibilities -- though Ferrer was something less than admirable in his surrender of the revenues to King James. All seem to have come from prominent families, products of the higher echelons of the feudal world, men accustomed to power and moving easily among the dignitaries of church and state. Strangely enough they will stay aloof from the baronial struggles in Valencia against royal encroachment. So clear is this that a modern authority can say (in terms too sweeping): "unlike the clergy of either Aragon or Catalonia, the Valencia clerics took little part in governmental affairs."⁽⁶⁶⁾ He suggests that this was because all except one bishop from 1234 to 1348 were Catalans rather than Aragonese. A more important reason may lie in the nature of diocesan economic support, which was monetary much more than by estates.

[28] The two qualities marking the bishops -- administrative competence developed by experience, and social background -- must have been of great use for the task confronting them. These same qualities help explain a certain coldness in the records, a preoccupation at the synods with externals and behavior, a superficiality in the approach to the problems of intensifying the religious life as opposed to mere elaboration of mechanisms designed for that end, and the reservation of enthusiasms until relatively unimportant questions of jurisdiction or property arose to stimulate them.

Knowing the needs of the time and place, seeing the jealousy between diocesan and religious clergy, aware of the ignorance and lack of instruction in the masses, one looks not only for competence and head but for sanctity and heart. Perhaps this is expecting more than the surviving records can be expected to yield. The first bishops seem at least to have been good men, experienced, dedicated to their administrative responsibilities, learned enough (especially Andrew and Jazpert), and well thought of by their contemporaries. In the end these qualities may have been just what was needed by a diocese in embryo, a chaos of immigration, adventurers, confused customs, and Moslem rebellion in an alien environment.

Administrative-Advisory: The Canons and Dignitaries

The cathedral chapter was in general the cathedral clergy. But it was a body quite separate from the bishop's household, and juridically separate from the bishop. It was a community not so much of brotherhood as of service. By the thirteenth century its forms had been profoundly influenced both by the new monasticism of the Gregorian Reformation and by the legal renaissance. Above all they were influenced by the numerous communal and associative experiments of contemporary Christendom. Like the university and the commune, the chapter was a full-fledged legal corporation. A body politic, with all the attributes of individuality and immortality in law possessed by other corporations, it deliberated democratically in its chapter house, passed its own laws binding on members, acted under its own seal, owned and exploited properties, took its grievances before the law, and jealously cherished its several rights and duties.

The chapter personnel were canons, diocesan clerics without vows. Each had his stall in the central choir of the church, a voice and vote in the chapter house (at Valencia, apparently the sacristy), usually some function or job, and an enviably substantial endowment or prebend as well as shares or dividends from a common fund. The canons or their choral vicars (voteless) gathered together at prescribed times throughout the day to chant with solemnity the liturgical hours. This service alone justified the existence of noncathedral chapters, those at collegiate churches regular or secular. And the huge medieval cathedrals, towering over the small cities of that day, were [29] primarily intended to accommodate the chapter in its daily, corporate devotions.

But at a cathedral the liturgical function was overshadowed by the canons' role as senate and general staff to the bishop. Beyond the advisory and administrative duties, and of course the electing of new bishops, the chapter had to provide a loyal opposition as defenders of diocesan rights. The bishop was bound to seek their counsel on a number of administrative details, and their consent on others. This close connection was well summed by the chapter of Valencia (1263): "the chapter is in the bishop, and the bishop is in the chapter."⁽⁶⁷⁾ The immediate context of this wording was juridical, indicating that the cause of the one involved the interests of the other. It also had a wider application. In practice, the powers of the chapter cut sharply into those of the bishop, and there would be some disputes. Here again was an institution preshaped, with evolved traditions, waiting only to be assigned a personnel.

Immediately after the city's fall a brisk organization of this body began. Within twenty months it was completed. Revenues had been assessed and divided; the principal dignitaries and the body of the canons, at least thirteen, appointed; labors assigned; and an agreement worked out as to the method of electing canons and dividing new revenue to come. The document which confirms all this presupposes, by its detail, considerable inquiry and discussion.⁽⁶⁸⁾ By the endowment document of 1241 the crown obliged itself to supply each canon with a house and small farm or garden -- the latter probably just beyond the city walls.⁽⁶⁹⁾ This seems to have been provided for by special purchase, at this time, of fourteen buildings fronting on the cathedral.⁽⁷⁰⁾

The original body of canons, less than a decade after its organization, applied to the Holy See for the high-privilege of immunity from disciplinary action by legates or delegates from Rome. There seems to have been no particular necessity for such a privilege; but the new corporation probably coveted it as a mark of favor and esteem such as older chapters had acquired. Pope Innocent IV duly granted the request for three years in 1246.⁽⁷¹⁾ At the end of the century when the new kingdom of Valencia has its own parliament, the cathedral chapter will receive a separate invitation from the king to participate.⁽⁷²⁾

At the period immediately following the surrender of the capital there were at least five canons.⁽⁷³⁾ Later the contemporary bishop of Gerona was to recall the original group set by the metropolitan as "some seven or eight."⁽⁷⁴⁾ This number increased within the year to over a dozen.⁽⁷⁵⁾ The housing endowment of 1241 supposes fourteen canons. By January 1257 the number had officially been fixed at fifteen, and approved by Rome.⁽⁷⁶⁾ In 1277 and 1279 due to augmented revenues this official ceiling was raised to twenty.⁽⁷⁷⁾ This quantity of canons equaled the number in ancient, established sees.⁽⁷⁸⁾

[30] The competition for the lucrative, honorific posts was undoubtedly keen. One cleric, who had been properly appointed, was refused admittance for a number of years for some reason. "The cleric Dominic Matthew has set before us a complaint," wrote the metropolitan in 1247; although "in the organizing of the church after the taking of Valencia city, we created him a canon of that church," difficulties had been made. "The case was brought to court, and on account of the objections, his rights [were] called into doubt." The archbishop settled the matter by testifying that Matthew "had been received by us into the body of canons of the Valencian church at the first creation of canons done by us there."⁽⁷⁹⁾

Some of the canonical number, invested with administrative responsibilities, enjoyed the revenues and rank of dignitaries. In the initial stages of the organization, these were limited to four: sacristan, precentor, and two archdeacons.⁽⁸⁰⁾ One of the canons acted as notary to the bishop. It is difficult to describe the offices of the dignitaries or the functionaries in detail because these varied from diocese to diocese and from time to time. Even the great contemporary Catalan lawyer Raymond of Penyafort refused the task in his Summa: "I shall not pursue the subject because, in these dignities and functions, there are just about as many varieties of custom as there are churches."⁽⁸¹⁾

The sacristan was not a minor caretaker as in modern usage, but a very important figure in the medieval diocese. Even in secular affairs he not infrequently fielded a respectable body of knights for the king's service. He guarded the liturgical treasures (a common name for him was treasurer) and the archives; he also saw to the purchase of valuable reliquaries, chalices, vestments, art work, and other ornaments. In a liturgical age his duties were central. In Valencia the office was established as soon as the city was conquered, the archdeacon and the sacristan being chosen from among the first canons.⁽⁸²⁾ A decree of June 1240 arranged for him to have 10 solidi from the first fruits and defunctions of the cathedral parish, plus supplementary salary to bring the total to 400 silver besants, a sum very soon increased to 600 besants.⁽⁸³⁾ Five years later the source of some of this supplementary salary is specified. It is to be taken from the first fruits and tithes of Ruzafa, Melilla, and Benimasot, and from the "rental pennies" which the bishop has in the capital. Half of this sum, however, was to be spent regularly for church furnishings (ornamentis).⁽⁸⁴⁾ The sacristan not unreasonably had the highest salary of anyone on the cathedral staff -- considering the function alone -- paying 400 solidi tithe in the annual taxation.⁽⁸⁵⁾

The precentor or chancellor of the chapter dictated and sealed all the chapter's official documents. For the organization of the canonical choir and its liturgical assignments, he was the central authority. He was also responsible for education, procuring and examining schoolteachers, whence his alternate title magister scholarum. A statute of June 14, 1242 confirmed [31] the arrangement for his salary in the recently formed chapter of Valencia: 300 silver besants a year from the bishop's own revenues, plus the first fruits of a parish to which he was to be appointed.⁽⁸⁶⁾ He paid tithes of 415 and 334 solidi respectively for the years 1279 and 1280.⁽⁸⁷⁾

Within the cathedral body the dean was supreme. He officiated liturgically when the bishop was absent, had jurisdiction and a kind of court for disciplinary problems involving the canons, and in general acted as director and disciplinarian, as well as intermediate at times between bishop and pastor. Strangely enough, this office was not formally established until June 1260, thirty years after the fall of the capital, when the dignity was decreed and the revenues of the churches of Segorbe and Altura were attached to it.⁽⁸⁸⁾ Later, in September 1277, the revenues of four churches were substituted -- Chelva, Tuéjar, Benagéber, and Sinarcas. To these were added the tithes of other churches such as Domeño, Andilla, Canales, Arcos, Aras de Alpuente, and Alpuente.⁽⁸⁹⁾ Nevertheless, an acting dean actually existed before this time, perhaps without status as a dignitary.⁽⁹⁰⁾ To the dignity of the deariery was annexed, as a gift from James of Jérica, the first fruits and two-thirds of the tithe for the castle and country of Domeño.⁽⁹¹⁾ This had represented the local lord's own share from ecclesiastical taxation in that region. The dean's office or salary-tax is not included in the tithe lists of 1279-1280, because he himself was a tax collector for those years.⁽⁹²⁾

Only one other dignitary need be considered, the archdeacon. At this moment in medieval history the archdeacon's office had attained its ripeness of power. He loomed in the diocese, "the bishop's eye," a figure of vague but sweeping powers, only less portentous than the bishop himself. After the conquest of Valencia be was the first dignitary chosen from the new chapter.⁽⁹³⁾ This functionary was usually not a priest,⁽⁹⁴⁾ nor properly active in the chapter; indeed, he was early warned away from interfering in the Valencian chapter.⁽⁹⁵⁾ Rather, be was a kind of alter ego of the bishop in his own archdeaconry, holding full jurisdiction, right of visitation, power to convoke synods, to approve new parishes, to collect taxes, to examine and present candidates for ordination, to impose discipline, to confer benefices, and to hold court for cases in his archdeaconry.

The "major" archdeacon was in the cathedral city. He was a much more significant figure than his rural peers like the archdeacon of Játiva. He lived directly behind the cathedral until about 1286, when his residence was changed to a building nearer the front. The southern or Játiva archdeaconry was planned by the authorities from the very beginning (January 1240); but, until that area was conquered, nothing could be done. The busy Bishop Arnold erected this lesser archdeaconry in mid-1248. Most of the revenues immediately around Játiva were assigned to it. The Játiva archdeacon was to provide clergy, give the care of souls, divide revenues, and so on.

[32] In Valencia, as elsewhere at this time, the bishop and archdeacon came into conflict. According to the metropolitan's revision in 1242 of the first constitution drawn for the Valencian diocese, the archdeacon had rights of visitation and correction, receiving for this a modest payment as hospitality (cena). The bishop retained superior jurisdiction over all the churches.⁽⁹⁶⁾ Where legal jurisdiction could be delegated within the city the archdeacon was to receive it, appeal being allowed from him only to the bishop. This latter arrangement was a compromise designed to still the quarrels in the Valencian church; it was to cease upon the death of the incumbent archdeacon. The subsequent struggle in Valencia soon narrowed to two key complaints: the jealous exclusiveness with which Archdeacon Martin refused episcopal intervention in legal cases within his jurisdiction; and his determination to usurp the bishop's own legal powers during the latter's frequent absences. There were also side issues, such as the archdeacon's refusal to part with certain fines and his opposition to the bishop's having an Official or vicar in legal cases.

After a lengthy period of "quarrels and discord" the two parties submitted the case to the metropolitan, renouncing their rights of appeal. As elsewhere in Europe the bishop came out rather the better, securing the power of delegation of cases throughout the diocese of Valencia, an Official, and half the fines.⁽⁹⁷⁾ Still, the income for the function of archdeacon was alone tithed at 250 solidi per annum in the years to come.⁽⁹⁸⁾ The agreements at Játiva must have followed the Valencia pattern. A jurisdictional quarrel was settled by the metropolitan. At the close of King James's rule the diocese erected further archdeaconries at Alcira and Murviedro. It is interesting to note that Barcelona had but one archdeaconry throughout the thirteenth century, three more being added only in 1324.

There were moments of tension, some of them serious, between bishop and chapter. But in general their relations were amicably adjusted according to a series of agreements arrived at by the two parties and incorporated into laws. There were revenues held in common and annually divided between the two bodies according to the agreements; and there were properly episcopal and properly capitular holdings, to say nothing of individual properties. Thus, an occasional contact between the two corporations can be found in the archives.⁽⁹⁹⁾ The communal life of these first canons in Valencia was at a minimum, for each lived in his own house with his own retinue.⁽¹⁰⁰⁾ Each canon was probably expected to maintain a certain show of state, as was the case in contemporary England, out of his own pocket.

A fairly numerous aggregate of assistants was required by a chapter. The cathedral of Huesca at this time (from 1266), for example, had ten portionarii -- four priests, three deacons, and three subdeacons; though not canons they assisted at the services and received a prebendial share of the cathedral revenues. There was also at Huesca a staff of "servitors" including bell-ringer,[33] notary, teacher of grammar, and two choir boys "of docile nature and tuneful voice."⁽¹⁰¹⁾ Valencia cathedral had such servitors from the beginning; provision is made for "all the servitors" in the revenue document of 1247.⁽¹⁰²⁾

Most of the canons were probably not priests; four of the twenty at Huesca had to be so by a law of 1291. There was usually a numerous body of laymen employed by a chapter as administrators, tithe gatherers, bailiffs, and the like. A bailiff of the chapter of Valencia cathedral, receiving monies from the bishop, appears in 1255.⁽¹⁰³⁾ Several functions could be filled by a single man. The archdeacon of Valencia, for example, is listed three times in the crusade assessment of 1280: 23 solidi from his Canon's portion, 260 from his salary as one of the ten overseers of revenue, and 248 from his own office. Similarly, the sacristan paid a total of 658 solidi from his functions as canon, overseer, and sacristan. The 1280 list gives almost thirty cathedral or episcopal functionaries by name, and a number of others anonymously.⁽¹⁰⁴⁾ In this list and that of 1279 special mention is made of a succentor (i.e. subcantor), two deacons, two subdeacons "of the diocese," two hebdomadarians, and by indirection a group of boys under the care of the school master. Some of the many entries were surely absentees; but they would be more than balanced by the minor functionaries exempt from contributions and from listing by reason of minimum income.

The personalities of the canons are less easily discerned than are their official selves. They included a decent scattering of academic men, and one illiterate. Of more significance, a large number of them were men of substance and importance. A closer examination of the individuals who comprised the chapter will emphasize this point. The names of most of them are known. During the brief reign of the first bishop (1240-1243), the following dignitaries and canons commonly appear in manuscripts: the archdeacon Master Martin of Entenza; the sacristan Arnold Piquer; the precentor Peter Dominic; Rudolph or Ralph Lemosin; Bertrand of Teruel; John Monzón; Matthew of Oteiza; Roderick Díaz; Bartholomew of Busquet or Boxadós; Master Bernard of Soler, Berengar of Targanova; Gerard or Gerald; Benedict of the Queen; Bernard of Vilar; Berengar the son of Raymond Vidal; and J. Vives.⁽¹⁰⁵⁾ About ten of these had been chosen and installed by the metropolitan, in the year after the fall of the city of Valencia.⁽¹⁰⁶⁾ Somewhat later (1245), in one of the more important documents of the early history of the diocese, the incomplete list of canons consists of ten of these sixteen names. Two years afterward (1247) a document formally arranging the collection of diocesan revenues lists nine of them, adding Gonzalvo Pérez.⁽¹⁰⁷⁾ There was also a Peter of Portugal in these early years, and several names or initials which are probably variants of those given.

These names appear again as the years pass, others gradually supplanting or supplementing them. Thus, Berengar of Boxadós is replaced as archdeacon [34] of Játiva by William of Romaní before 1260; Peter Michael in turn succeeds him. Others in these middle years include Michael of Alcover, Peter Gomar canon and Official, Master William of Arbea, William of Arenys, and Benedict of Leduy. Forty years after the conquest of Valencia city, the names of many of the canons are inserted in the crusade-tithe lists (1279-1280): the archdeacon William of Alaric (succeeding Constantine), the sacristan James Albalat, the precentor Raymond of Morera or Morara (succeeding Peter Michael), the dean Raymond of Bellestar (succeeding James Sarroca), Peter Pérez of Tarazona, Dominic Matthew, Bertrand, Arnold of Rexach, Andrew, Benedict, Gerald of Albalat, Oliver, Pontilian (Garrigues), Master Ralph, Bernard of Vilar, Arnold Busquet, and Peter Cambrer.⁽¹⁰⁸⁾ To these should be added Master Vincent, William of Arenys, Nicholas of Hungary, and some others. Yet more names appear in the run of documents, men like the sacristan Peter of the King, the Valencia city archdeacon Bernard of Canet, the Alcira archdeacon Arnold of Riusech, and William of Mollet (canon in 1280, dean by 1299). Some men like Bernard of Vilar span the development of the chapter, in a continuing series of documents for decades.

Turning to individuals on these lists, one is further instructed as to their social origins. The lawyer James Sarroca, who was to advance to the dignity of dean, was able to buy castles and extensive properties, to accumulate benefices, and eventually to become the major power behind the throne in the declining years of James the Conqueror; he rose to be the king's royal secretary, favorite confidant, treasurer, and unofficial chancellor. Eventually he became bishop of Huesca.⁽¹⁰⁹⁾ Benedict of Leduy was a royal chaplain; he founded a chaplaincy by the purchase of properties bringing in over 200 solidi annually. Giles Garcés of Azagra, son of a crusading baron, and canon of Valencia just after mid-century, purchased two towns for 4,000 morabatins in 1258 and received from the king in 1260 Perpunchent castle.⁽¹¹⁰⁾ Arnold of Rexach was chaplain to the prince; he was to become archdeacon of Játiva and a bishop.⁽¹¹¹⁾

The sacristan William of Marie once made a loan to the prince of 1,000 solidi of Jaca. He and his retainers were to cause a disgraceful tumult in Gerona (1262). He collected the bovage of the realm in 1280 for the king, and his brother James acted in 1259 as crown bailiff of Almenara. The James of Alaric sent by King James as ambassador to the khan of the Mongols may be his brother; if so, both are from a wealthy burgher family of Perpignan.⁽¹¹²⁾ Peter of the King, holder of a second canonry at Lérida and prior of St. Vincent's, was probably an illegitimate brother of King James.⁽¹¹³⁾ William of Romaní, archdeacon of Játiva, seems to be a member of the powerful knightly family of that name in Valencia. Nicholas of Hungary may well have been a royal in-law, and he had financial dealings with the king's son.⁽¹¹⁴⁾

[35] Gonzalvo Pérez, canon (for example in 1247), then capiscol (by 1254), then city archdeacon (by 1256), was the brother of the knight Roderick Pérez; he was secretary to the king since before 1250. He continued to exercise this latter office at Lérida and elsewhere, even after he became archdeacon. He also acquired the dignity of the archdeaconry of Calatayud. He was a custodian of Murviedro castle, was named by King James to arbitrate a dispute between Aragon and Castile, and appears as one of two executors and presumably friends in the last will of the great baron Simon Pérez of Arenós. In a document of 1268, be gave to the son of that baron as a gift "my castle of Alventosa located in the kingdom of Valencia" including all the revenues, jurisdiction, and inhabitants he controlled there. An unabashed pluralist, be later became bishop of Sigüenza.⁽¹¹⁵⁾

Martin of Entenza, the first archdeacon of Valencia, was chancellor to Prince Alphonse. From the prince he received as a gift the town and castle of Foyos in Valencia. He also had a crown subsidy of 1,000 solidi a year to be taken from the saltworks. One finds him in various places and times as a signatory to important public documents, as at the treaty of Almizra in 1244 and at the pact between the king and the prince at Biar in 1254. He founded two benefices at the Valencia cathedral in 1252, and seems to have died around 1257. He was related to the future archdeacon Gonzalvo Pérez, and also to King James.⁽¹¹⁶⁾ The archdeacon Constantine seems to have been a friend of the king; James thus refers to him when granting Constantine's nephew the secretariat of a town in Aragon.⁽¹¹⁷⁾ Even the illiteracy of Roderick Díaz, in the position of canon, smacks more of the influential knight than of the deserving cleric.⁽¹¹⁸⁾

The canon Peter Michael in 1258 was able to buy houses and shops in Valencia city to the value of 1,000 solidi; and he purchased privately a former Moslem cemetery. He was precentor at least by 1270, and with others represented the king in a financial suit involving 100,000 solidi. He finished by becoming archdeacon of Játiva.⁽¹¹⁹⁾ Master Vincent also held the office of precentor of Majorca; Matthew of Oteiza was also archpriest of Teruel; and Berengar of Soler was a papal subdeacon as well as notary to the king.⁽¹²⁰⁾ Gerald of Albalat had the name of a most prominent family. Michael of Alcover was a notary in the service of Bishop Andrew, in the latter's office of chancellor to the king; as such Bishop Andrew had him drawing up official documents at least from 1245 to 1259 at various places in the king's realms.⁽¹²¹⁾

Bertrand of Teruel left a last testament revealing something of his background and character. A wealthy man of the warrior class whose business instincts had led him to gather varied estates in the new realm, he bequeathed "my castle at Espioca"; "my armor"; "all my vineyards"; "my converted slave," whom he frees; "my red horse"; "all my arms"; 3,600 solidi for the establishment of a chantry, naming his nephew to the post; his wine cellar; [36] 2,500 solidi to the Dominicans; many buildings and corrals; and so on.⁽¹²²⁾ A number of lesser names in the lists have a knightly ring to them, though evidence to confirm this impression is lacking.⁽¹²³⁾

Peter Pérez of Tarazona was the brother of Roderick Pérez and the son of the justiciar of Aragon; he was thus directly connected with the most influential single baron of that province or kingdom. He seems to have been among the first canons named, and to have died about 1280. He held a number of estates and houses, some of the latter fronting upon the cathedral in Valencia city. In his last testament of 1279 he disposed of properties to the value of 15,000 solidi; he also left 4,000 solidi for a cathedral chaplaincy, his brother Roderick to hold the patronage. Items include 400 solidi for a fine tomb, and 200 for books and other gifts to another brother.⁽¹²⁴⁾

All this evidence leads to the suspicion that the higher clergy of Valencia suffered under the blight of "feudalization," with the avaricious families of knightly or high burgher status crowding into the positions of prestige and power. This would be in keeping with the general trend in Europe at the time. Many churches as a result held a majority of nonpriests in the chapter, men who kept a door open for a good marriage in the family interest or for a return to secular life.⁽¹²⁵⁾ Valencia too may have been a dumping ground for friends of the mighty, who could thus confer the rewards of friendship with the powerful at the expense of the church and to the loss of the community.

Numbers of the canons may well have been absentees, delegating their liturgical responsibilities to vicars. It is difficult for instance to find documents in which all the canons are at Valencia. During the arrangements for the election of a new bishop in 1248, those of the canons "who were then on hand" were present.⁽¹²⁶⁾ When the canon and the royal notary Michael of Alcover lay dying, he was in Tortosa and had to make provision for one of his two "animals" to carry his corpse to Valencia.⁽¹²⁷⁾

Since so much documentation has survived in the cathedral archives, it would be relatively easy to compile a directory of these canons and dignitaries from 1238 to 1280. The analytical survey just given will probably be more suggestive. It is not a heartening thing to contemplate, this capture of ecclesiastical influence by the class of men whose interests and mentality ought rather to have been curbed and instructed by that counterbalancing authority. One suspects that the result was to clothe the status quo in the garments of pious respectability.

Still, considered as an element in the assimilation of the frontier, such a body of men must have been invaluable. They gave many a feudal family a stake in the pioneer community. They brought the energy, talents, and social connection of their class to the task at hand. And they could deal as equals with the turbulent or selfish knights of the new realm, since few of them could be dismissed as "a clerk and a base person.⁽¹²⁸⁾ Conversely, the frontier offered to king and prelate a golden opportunity to reward service or [37 ]merit; so that a number of admirable figures, like James Sarroca, brought some energies to bear upon this far corner, when otherwise the ecclesiastical organization might have lacked their contribution. And, at the most conspicuous level of canonical life, the daily service of the altar, the chapter with its accompanying assistants would have had a continuing impact upon the local population.

1. Summa ad manuscriptorum fidem recognita et emendata sacrorum canonum...(Verona, 1744), lib. III, tit. XXVII, no. 4, p. 331: "multa enim alia, quae difficile esset enumerare, quum ipse sit preordinator in cunctis." Though they are not cited in this chapter, there are a large number of copies of Valencia cathedral documents concerning administration, finances, and privileges in Bibl. Univ. Val., MS codex 145, e.g. docs. 17, 20, 22; cf. also codex 799. On dioceses at this period see W. M. Plöchl, Geschichte des Kirchenrechts, 3 vols. (Vienna, 1959-1960), II, 155 ff. and 141 ff.; more briefly H. E. Feine, Kirchenliche Rechtsgeschichte (Weimar, 1955), pp. 321 ff.

2. E. Mayer, Historia de las instituciones sociales y politicas de España y Portugal durante los siglos v a xiv, 2 vols. (Madrid, 1925-1926), II, 288-289.

3. They were all called to the Valencian parliament of 1301, for example, as was the cathedral chapter (Documenta selecta mutuas civitatis arago-cathalaunicae et ecclesiae relationes ilustrantia, ed. Johannes Vincke [Barcelona, 1936], doc. 94, Nov. 18, 1301).

4. See the sympathetic survey of the problem by Isacio Rodríguez, "Los orígines históricos de la exención de los regulares," Revista española de derecho canónico, X (1955), 583-608, and XI (1956), 243-27 I. The Valencian phases of the struggle are considered below in the chapters on the Orders.

5. Ramón Menéndez Pidal, La España del Cid, 4th ed. revised, 2 vols. (Madrid, 1947), p. 807. Quote from Llibre dels feyts, ch. 365. "In all the towns which were big, which God granted us to win from the Saracens, we built a church of Our Lady St. Mary" (ch. 450). There was no further title for the cathedral like the Assumption as some later writers imagined (Viage literario a las iglesias de España, ed. J. Villanueva, 17 vols. in 22 [Madrid, 1803-1852], I, 30-31). See also Ramón de María, "Jaime I dedica Peñíscola a Santa María y dota su culto," BSCC, XXI (1945), 233-235.

6. Sanchís Sivera, Catedral de Valencia, p. 14.

7. Aureum opus, doc. 28 of series for Peter III (1283).

8. Ibid.,doc. 35, fol. 11Cr,v (an. 1250); Mass was to be stopped before the Gospel, while they swore an oath before the bailiff and by this act assumed office.

9. Llibre dels feyts, ch. 365.

10. Colección diplomática, doc. 1,353 (July 28, 1271): "ad plateam Sancte Marie maiorem ad ecclesiam eiusdem."

11. "Anno Domini M/CCLXII -- X kalend. Ju / lii fuit positus primarius lapis / in Ecclesia Beate Marie / sedis Valentine per / venerabilem patrem / fratrem Andream / tertium Va / lentine Civitatis Episcopum" (inscription on the cornerstone, which disappeared in the eighteenth century; see Antigüedades de Valencia, I, 222, where Teixidor has copied it, and the slightly different version in Sanchís Sivera, Catedral de Valencia, p. 5). The cathedral, like the previous mosque, was on the site of the Roman forum.

12. Elías Tormo y Monzó has published a long study of this first stage of the construction, drawing upon archeological and artistic analogies ("La catedral gótica de Valencia," III Congrés d'història de la corona d'Aragó, dedicat al període compres entre la mort de Jaume I i la proclamació del rey Don Ferrán d'Antequera, 2 vols. [Valencia, 1923], I, 1-36). Some conclusions of Sanchís Sivera (Catedral de Valencia, e.g. p. 8) modify those of Tormo; he believes the building was begun in Romanesque-Byzantine style. On the Valencia cathedral see also J. H. Harvey, The Cathedrals of Spain (London, 1957), esp. p. 173; and the useful but very small volume by F. Almela y Vives, La catedral de Valencia, in the series Colecció Sant Jordi, series 2, no. 5 (Barcelona, 1927). There is a stimulating comparative study by Pierre Lavedan in his L'architecture gothique religieuse en Catalogne, Valence et Baléares (Paris, 1935), ch. 2.

13. Arch. Cath., perg. 2,366 (Mar. 25, 1249): "porticum, archus, portalia, anuanum, bescalinum, pontem nec alium quodlibet cohopertum." See also Aureum opus, doc. 27, fol. 11A (an. 1249): "sit semper undique libera et discohoperta omnino," without narrowing the streets, "in tota via et in toto circuitu vel orbicularitate ecclesie beate Marie sedis Valentie." The position of the cathedral on a height of ground, and the open plazas around, are spoken of by José Rodrigo Pertegás, "La urbe valenciana en el siglo xiv," Congrés III, pp. 319-322. Testaments have requests to be buried "in claustro" here (e.g. Arch. Cath. Val., perg. 5,962; Mar. 5, 1241) and a parliament is held "in claustro" in December 1283. A "master of the works" of the cathedral appears in an unrelated property transaction of 1268: "A. Vidal magistri opens...Sancte Marie Valencie" (Arch. Crown, Reg. Canc. 15, fol. 97; April 30, 1268); in 1273 Vidal was master of works for the Alcira irrigation canal and held property nearby which "affrontat in hereditate Andree de Albalato" (not the recently deceased bishop of Valencia? ibid., Reg. Canc. 19. fol. 84v, Dec. 8, 1273; see the two documents naming Vidal on fol. 105v, Feb. 24, 1273).

14. See the observations of Sanchís Sivera (Catedral de Valencia, pp. 56 ff., 75). Harvey believes the door to be "clearly inspired" by the main front of Tarragona "but with further reference" to the south transept of Notre Dame (Cathedrals, p. 174); he finds the Romanesque Puerta del Palau with its "traces of mudéjar and of the coming Gothic Transition a strange design to have been carried out" after 1262, and he remarks the "very close resemblance" to the work of the "notoriously conservative" Lérida school (p. 173).

15. Arch. Cath., perg. 1,326 (Mar. 24, 1257): "cupientes igitur ut Ecclesia Valentina que in honore beate Marie Virginis constructa esse dinoscitur congruis honoribus frequentetur, omnibus vere penitentibus et confessis qui ecclesiam ipsam in Quattuor festivitatibus ipsius Virginis et in Octavis ipsarum visitaverint annuatim de omnipotentis dei misericordia...Quadraginta dies de iniunctis sibi penitentiis misericorditer relaxamus."

16. See, for example, the contract in Arch. Cath., perg. 1,320 (Feb. l0, 1250): "vendimus vobis Magistro Dominico precentori valentino fructus unius prebende que cotidie duodecim denarios monete Regalis valencie valere debeat, et promittimus vobis et heredibus vestris et successoribus qui ius patronatus super hoc... fuerint consecuti, providere perpetuo sine difficultate aliqua uno sacerdoti pro anima vestra et parentum vestrorum in nostra Ecclesia in altare maiori missam...cotidie celebranti, in portione duodecim denariorum Regalium in Civitate Valentina." Sanchís Sivera, Catedral de Valencia, app. B (pp. 486-507), has all the benefices culled from the documents with information on each.

17. Arch. Cath., perg. 3,104 (Aug. 8, 1267): "vendimus vobis Guillermo de areyns Canonico valentino fructus unius prebende que cotidie XII denarii...valere debeat, et promittimus in heredibus vestris et successoribus omnibus quod" (continuation similar to document in note 16).

18. J. R. Moorman cites the example of Bishop Swinfield who moved his household of forty men 81 times in 296 days, so as to be near his food and fuel; episcopal debt in England is treated here too (Church Life in England in the Thirteenth Century, Cambridge, England, 1946, pp. 176, 171 ff.).

19. E. de Moreau, Histoire de l'église en Belgique, 6 vols. (Brussels, 1941-1952), II, 1; to appreciate the truth of this for the realms of Aragon one has only to consult the elaborate itinerary of James I (Itinerari, pp. 545-547).

20. Arch. Cath., perg. 2,343 (an. 1270): "in palacio domini episcopi Valentini"; legajo LX, fasc. 1 (perg., an. 1260): "in palacio nostro Valencie." The "palace" of the archbishop of Tarragona, when James was a child, was a building of wood (libre dels feyts, ch. 11). James speaks of "your house or houses" (Arch. Crown, James I, Reg. Canc. 21, fol. 22, April 18, 1272). The evidence as to its position is discussed both by Teixidor and Chabás in Antigüedades de Valencia, I, 191-193, 198-200, and II, 255. The bishop's residence was supposed to be of suitable dignity; the bishop of Toulouse from 1179 to 1200 was thought to be in straits because "vivebat in episcopali hospitio ut burgensis" upon a few rents, the knights and monasteries having all his tithes (J. H. Mundy, Liberty and Political Power in Toulouse, 1050-1230 [New York, 1954], p. 292). The arcades acquired in Chapter VIII below, note 40 seem to have been for enlarging the bishop's palace. There is an episcopal cellarium, probably a part of the complex of houses, in Arch. Cath., perg. 1,229 (June 6, 1270).

21. See note 70, and Chapter VIII, note 10.

22. Arch. Cath., perg. 2,391 (Sept. 18, 1255): "in domibus Episcopi"; and perg. 4,647 (July 16, 1263): "in domo domini Episcopi valentie."

23. Arch. Cath., perg. 2,309 (June 23, 1240): Peter Salvatoris, "notarius domini episcopi." The bishop's notary appears also in perg. 2,381 (July 19, 1250) and elsewhere.

24. Furs, lib. III, rub. V, c. 37. A cleric answered to this court even for his land if the church owned it.

25. Litigation delayed his complete emergence and qualified his powers; see below, p. 32. Arch. Cath., perg. 2,312 (Feb. 11, 1243) is the sentence allowing one to be constituted; but the strife leading to this decision indicates a previous existence of the office. Perg. 4,647 (July 16, 1263) has: "non tenetur coram vobis Raimundo de Belester oficiali domini episcopi Valencie." See also Arch. Crown, Peter III, Reg. Canc. 56, fol. 13 (Mar. 1, 1284) where William Mollet holds the office, and Reg. 59, fol. 40v (July 23, 1282). The Official appears fully at Rheims in 1182, at Cambrai in 1194, at Thérouanne in 1196. In a single long episcopate at Tournai there were eight in succession (1215-1251). Cologne had one only from the mid-thirteenth century. His basic function was as delegate judge for the bishop in cases in the external forum, though his actual powers could proliferate in other directions. He resembles, but should not be confused with, the vicar-general or procurator whose functions were wider. See Moreau, Église en Belgique, III, 330 ff., and Edouard Fournier, Les origines du vicaire général, étude d'histoire et de droit canon (Paris, 1922), chs. 4, 5 on the Official.

26. See, for example, Arch. Cath., perg. 2,358 (July 11, 1252): "R. Belestar officialis." The crusade tithe of 1279 gives "G. de Moleto officialis domini episcopi Valentini"; see the Rationes decimarum Hispaniae (1279-1280), ed. José Rius Serra (Barcelona, 1946-1947), I, 260. William Mollet is Official in 1285 ("de Moleto"), and Peter Gomar later that year, in Arch. Crown, Peter III, Reg. Canc. 56, fol. 13, and Reg. Canc. 58, fol. 99. For the petition of the parent Berengar of Morena, see Arch. Crown doc., below in Chapter XI, note 45 (Dec. 9, 1284).

27. Arch. Cath., perg. 2,345 (Mar. 11, 1241); perg. 2,368 (only as "B," the "penitencialis domini Episcopi"); and in 1242, perg. 2,327 (see Colección diplomática, doc. 1,044). Ordinatio ecclesiae valentinae, p. 364 (Matthew).

28. Ordinatio, p. 359: "ipse iverat pro quadam causa ad Archiepiscopum Terrachonensem, et invenit ibi multos litigantes"; p. 364, other witness.

29. Arch. Cath., perg. 2,334 (Nov. 9, 1243): "P. capellanus Episcopi Valentini," but he is only among the signatories of one copy of this document; ibid., legajo LX, fasc. 1 (perg.) for the official erection and endowment (Sept. 16, 1260). Rationes decimarum, I, 259, 264.

30. Arch. Cath., perg. 4,657 (Dec. 20, 1273): "ego Gaston de Conyello baiulus Episcopi auctoritate domini Episcopi dono et stabilio vobis..."; also perg. 2,351 (an. 1241). Arch. Crown, Peter III, Reg. Canc. 41, fol. 98 (June 27, 1279). Colección diplomática, docs. 900 (an. 1261) and 959 (an. 1265). The Alcoy bailiwick is sold in Arch. Cath., perg. 707 (Feb. 12, 1259) to "Raymundo de Almenar[a] vassallo nostro." Others are noted below, in Chapter IX.

31. Arch. Crown, James I, Reg. Canc. 15, fol. 78v (Jan. 26, 1267).

32. Arch. Crown, Peter III, Reg. Canc. 44, fol. 206v (July 15, 1281): "vobis magistro Bartholomeo de Garleyno dicti Episcopi fisico."

33. Arch. Cath., perg. 4,620 (Nov. 20, 1248): "vi tabulas comedendi, inter quas est tabula rotunda, et xii banchia et iii scamna sedendi."

34. This is not surprising for the time and place. Thus, Peter of Castellnou, bishop of Gerona, enfranchised in his testament of 1278 one Matthew "baptizaturn nostrum," but ordered his other slaves "ba[p]tizatos et sarracenos" to be sold. Bertrand of Berga, bishop of Elne, in Roussillon, in his testament of 1259 disposed of eight slaves, including six "pagans." See Charles Verlinden, L'esclavage dans l'Europe médiévale, one volume to date, Péninsule ibérique, France (Bruges, 1955), I, 303, 754, 254n. 257. See also J. Miret y Sans, "La esclavitud en Cataluña en los ultimos tiempos de la edad media," Revue hispanique, XLI (1917), 1-109. "Les esclaves sont infiniment plus nombreux aux deux derniers siècles du moyen âge qu'au xiiie," Verlinden notes (p. 427). His analogy of Valencia with Majorca on this subject (pp. 437-438) does not seem well taken, since the manner of conquest in the former involved less enslavement. The moral problem is indicated by Verlinden's examples from the next period (cf. pp. 420 ff.).

35. Documenta selecta, doc. 100 (Jan. 1, 1303).

36. Olmos y Canalda has a short biography of every Valencian bishop in his Prelados valentinos (Madrid, 1949). Statistics for each episcopate are of course listed in C. Eubel, Hierarchia catholica medii aevi sive summorum pontificum, s.r.e. cardinalium, ecclesiarum antistitum series ab anno 1198, 3 vols., 2nd ed. (Munich, 1913-1914), I, 512, and in P. B. Gams, Series episcoporum ecclesiae catholicae quotquot innotuerunt a beato Petro apostolo (Leipzig, 1931), pp. 87-88. See too the list and commentary in Viage literario, I, 46 ff.; and Fuente, Historia eclesiástica, IV, ch. 17. On the bishops of Valencia a century and a half earlier, see Menéndez Pidal, España del Cid, II, ch. 17. An excellent description of a contemporary diocese in action, though with obvious differences, is Pierre Andrieu Guitrancourt, L'archevêque Eudes Rigaud et la vie de l'église au xiiie siècle d'après le "regestrum visitationum" (Paris, 1938); Eudes was consecrated archbishop of Rouen in 1248. For contemporary England, see Moorman's fine chapters in Church Life, chs. 12-17; for comparative illustrations from Belgium see Moreau, Église en Belgique, II, ch. 4.

37. S. Ruiz, "Bérenger de Castelbisbal," DHGE, VIII, col. 371. Vincke, Staat und Kirche, p. 269. Witness' quote is from Ordinatio ecclesiae valentinae, p. 364. On the effects of the tongue-cutting episode in the kingdom of Valencia see Chapter XII, note 19 and text.

38. The alternate name Ferrer of San Martín seems to be a misnomer (see Diócesis valentina, II, 415-416).

39. Arch. Cath., perg. 2,309 (June 23, 1240). Besides the short sketch in the Prelados valentinos of Olmos Canalda, see Fidel Fita, "Don Pedro de Albalat, arzobispo de Tarragona, y Don Ferrer Pallarés obispo de Valencia, cuestiones cronológicas," BRAH, XL (1902), 335-352. There is a longer study by José Sanchís y Sivera, "El obispo Ferrer de Pallarés," in Diócesis valentina, II, 412-466. His trip to Rome, recorded in Episcopologio valentino (pp. 372 -373), is a fable. On Ferrer see also the documents in the Itinerari, pp. 86-89, 94-95, 144, 152, 155, 157, 477, 551.

40. On these questions see Chapter XIV.

41. Ibid.

42. The prepositus (prior, provost, dean) at Tarragona was a prestigious figure at this time; he had choice revenues, custody of the common rents and temporalities, and the decisive vote in a deadlocked election for the metropolitanate (Viage literario, XIX, 85). Ferrer held the post from 1217 (ibid., XIX, 184, and see p. 128).

43. Itinerari, pp. 86, 94; see pp. 86-89, 144, 152, 551.

44. Llibre dels feyts, ch. 54; but the four knights here promised became an army later.

45. Olmos Canalda, Prelados valentinos, p. 59.

46. Vincke, Staat und Kirche, p. 270. Sanchís Sivera wrongly assumes that all these rewards, including such gifts as sixty-one houses and seventy-five jovates of land, became the personal wealth of Ferrer (Diócesis valentina, II, 416-417); actually, he had to subdivide them among his followers. He received a good but personal gift in Valencia later (Repartimiento, pp. 246, 251).

47. Colección diplomática, doc. 989 (Feb. 26, 1274), an account by King James himself, who is aggrieved that his motives were misunderstood.

48. Ibid. King James says the five canons "tunc temporis de curia nostra erant."

49. Itinerari, p. 477 (Mar. 1, 1273).

50. The minute of the metropolitan council, the notice from Nolasco's life ("tristatus est valde"), and the cathedral necrology ("nequiter iugulatus") are all conveniently given in full in Diócesis valentina II, 440. On the reliability of the Nolasco source, see below, Chapter XIII, note 84 and text.

51. J. Sanchís y Sivera, "El obispo de Valencia Arnaldo de Peralta," BRAH, LXXXII (1923), 40-64, 104-121. The bishop of Lérida (from 1254) may have been his brother. See too A. Lambert, "Arnauld de Peralta," DHGE, IV, cols. 518-523; this covers the main elements of his life satisfactorily. See Olmos Canalda, Prelados valentinos, pp. 62-66; and Lamberto de Zaragoza and Ramón de Huesca, Teatro histórico de las iglesias del reyno de Aragón, 9 vols. (Pamplona, 1780-1807), II, 243-247. The cathedral documents for this reign as for the others have all been studied and are cited below where the separate subjects are given individual attention. The commission of electors in 1243 comprised the metropolitan, the bishop of Tortosa, and the canons Roderick Díaz, Matthew of Oteiza, Bertrand of Teruel, and Bartholomew Busquet, all apparently meeting at Tarragona in May.

52. There is no reason to doubt the assertions of Diago and Escolano to this effect, as does Sanchís Sivera ("Arnaldo de Peralta," p. 42). It will be precisely against his predecessor's financial surrender to James that the chapter protests (see below, Chapter VIII); and the seemingly free gifts admired by Sanchís Sivera in this episcopate are really attempts to rectify that original injustice. The case will end in the king's ungraciously yielding late in the reign (1272).

53. More closely connected with the tithes; see Chapter VIII.

54. Antonio Barberá Sentamáns, El derecho canónico valentino comparado con el general de la iglesia (Valencia, 1928), p. 29. The Valencian synods of the thirteenth century are carefully examined on pp. 28-42. The conciliar volumes of Aguirre and Villanuño cause confusion by attributing to Arnold synodal legislation which belongs to his successor Andrew. Synods in Valencia usually took place in October in the cathedral.

55. Bishop Ferrer had planned the division (see note 80 and text), but Játiva had not then been conquered. The churches of Játiva itself, and their revenues with the exception of episcopal rights, were given in benefice to the new archdeaconry: "Ecclesie beate Marie Xative cum quibusdam Ecclesiis seu Capellis infra eius terminos constitutis et constituendis"; these are spelled out in detail in the document of Arnold, given by Jazpert in a subsequent confirmation (Arch. Cath., perg. 1,091, July 8, 1248). In this area around the city of Játiva, the archdeacon is to collect the first fruits and such and to provide for the resident vicars, whom he may choose and present to the bishop.

56. Papal approval of the transfer was formally given to him in a ceremony of October 24, 1248; this is copied by Sanchís Sivera in his "Arnaldo de Peralta" (pp. 117-118). But a document of August 25 from the metropolitan had previously transferred Arnold. He died about 1269. In 1259-1260 he had gone to Rome to defend the rights of Segorbe -- the sees of Zaragoza and Albarracín having combined to protest Segorbe's inclusion in the province of Toledo.

57. Llibre dels feyts, ch. 237.

58. Arch. Cath., perg. 4,620 (Nov. 20, 1248). The list includes 3,000 "quartarios" of wine, some cloth, "unam rotam de carreta," tables and benches, "unum lectum iacendi...et unam cathedram, et unum foustol...et ii armaria que sunt in boteleria, et unam archam," "unam scalam, et unam barcelam," "i molendinum mostadie," "i quadratum fusti et xxi tabulas plumbi, et viij portas vetulas, et unam scutellam pictam, apud Moroveteri ii botas magnas et vi parvas....Item apud Algesiram iiij botas et unam tinam. Item apud Xativam iiij botas. Item apud Xivam ii botas," also "unam palam ferri," "unam aliam ollam de coure," and so on. A transcription, slightly differing from my own, is also given by Sanchís Sivera ("Arnaldo de Peralta," pp. 119-120).

59. See the sketch of his life in Olmos Canalda, Prelados valentinos, pp. 67-72; and Vincke in Staat und Kirche, p. 27!. A document in the cathedral archives describes the formalities attending this election. A representative of the metropolitan read the papal letter (Aug. 25, 1248) announcing the transfer of Arnold to the see of Zaragoza, and ordering a new election. Meanwhile, "dominum A[rnoldum Piquer] Valentinum sacristam unanimiter vicarium constituerunt," with spiritual jurisdiction and a partial procuration in temporals. The election took place on an assigned day, in the cathedral at the place where the chapter usually met; it was "sub forma compromissi," the choice being made by the archdeacon, the precentor, and the metropolitan. See perg. 1,318 (Oct. 24, 1248).

60. See Chapter III, note 8. Speaking of the Tarragona lord Benedict of Albalat, on the crusade with his brother the archbishop, the Trobes of Jaume Febrèr say: "Son germá menor Bisbe es de Valencia / E alli se ha restat ab gran convenencia" ([Valencia, 1796-1797], p. 24, troba 23).

61. This activity on the part of all four bishops is documented as part of the section on the economic organization of the diocese, in Chapters VIII and IX. On Andrew's synods see Barberá Sentamáns, Derecho canónico valentino, pp. 29 ff.

62. These prepositurae were lucrative for the holders but were not accounted among the dignities of the cathedral (see the Regestum Clementis Papae V, ed. Benedictine monks, 12 vols. [Paris, 1885-1957], III, no. 2,514, Feb. 12, 1308). "Multa litigia" were to result from this remedy (Lettres communes de Jean XXII, 1316-1334, ed. G. Mollat, 16 vols. [Paris, 1921-1946], III, 288, no. 13, May 23, 1321 but referring back to this period at Valencia).

63. His career as plenipotentiary of the pope is touched on by M. H. Laurent in Le bienheureux Innocent V (Pierre de Tarentaise) et son temps, Studi e testi, no. 129 (Rome, 1947), pp. 184-185.

64. Olmos Canalda, Prelados valentinos, pp. 73-75. His epitaph supplies the portrait: "presul. Jazpertus. jacet. hic. jurista. disertus," continuing later: "Pulcher. formosus. largus. letus. generosus" (copied by Villanueva, Viage literario, I, 48-49.)

65. See Ángel Fábrega Grau, "Actitud de Pedro III el Grande de Aragón ante la propia deposición fulminada por Martín IV," Sacerdozio e regno, pp. 176 ff. On the Desclot chronicle (Desclot a pseudonym or a scribe) see Manuel de Montoliu, Les quatre grans cròniques (Barcelona, 1959), p. 56. On Arnold of Vilanova's "Epistola ad episcopum valentinum" see Revue d'histoire ecclésiastique, LV (1960), 733. Quote is from Desclot, Crònica, ch. 96.

66. Shneidman,  "Government in Thirteenth Century Valencia," p. 187.

67. Arch. Cath., perg. 4,647 (July 16, 1263): "capitulum est in Episcopo et Episcopus in capitulo." For a historical survey of chapters, their evolution, powers, internal organization, and relations to the bishop, see P. Torquebiau, "Chapitres de chanoines", DDC, III, cols. 530-595; also his articles "Chanoines" (cols. 471-488), "Curie diocésaine" (IV, cols. 961-971); and G. Mollat, "Bénéfices ecciésiastiques en occident," (I, cols. 406-448). See too my "The Organization of a Mediaeval Cathedral Community: the Chapter of Valencia (1238-1280)," Church History, XXXI (1962), 14-23; and Plöchl, Kirchenrechts, I, 155-163 with bibliography.

68. Arch. Cath., perg. 2,309 (June 23, 1240). Only in 1282 was the honorary silk cape made obligatory (each medieval chapter evolved its own type and colors).

69. Aureum opus, doc. 12, fol. 4r,v (November 1241).

70. See document in Chapter VIII, note 10. The purchase permit for fourteen houses owned by the crown (1241) was reissued again in 1265 ("domos seu hospicia...ad habitaciones vestras proprias," Arch. Cath., perg. 1,339; Colección diplomática, doc. 918, Dec. 19, 1265).

71. Arch. Cath., perg. 2,862 (Oct. 22, 1246). "Innocentius episcopus servus servorum dei, Dilectis filiis Capitulo Ecclesie Valentine, Salutem et apostolicam benedictionem. Vestris devotis precibus inclinati auctoritate vobis presentium indulgemus ut nullus sedis apostolice delegatus vel delegati subdelegatus eiusdem executor seu eciam conservator a sede deputatus eadem in vos suspensionis aut interdicti seu excomunicationis sententiam valeat promulgare sine ipsius sedis speciali mandato faciente de indulgentia huiusmodi mentionem. Nullo ergo hominum liceat hanc paginam nostre concessionis infringere vel ei ausu temerario contraire. Si quis autem hoc attemptare presumpserit indignationem omnipotentis dei et beatorum Petri et Pauli apostolorum eius se noverit incursurum. Presentibus post triennium minime valituris. Datum Lugdun., xi kalendas Novembri, Pontificatus nostri anno tertio."

72. Documenta selecta, doc. 94 (1301).

73. Colección diplomática, doc. 989 (Feb. 26, 1274).

74. Ordinatio ecclesiae valentinae, p. 320: "creavit ad vii vel octo canones."

75. Ibid., p. 233. Chosen and installed by the metropolitan, their names were given for this trial record by his procurator. The solemn document issued by the chapter in 1247 (see below, document in Chapter VIII, note 135) has ten canons signing, with the information that "non erant alii canonici tunc presentes"; the missing canons were probably few in number, since the business on hand was a constitution on the future division of canonical income.

76. Arch. Cath., perg. 1,325 (Jan. 29, 1257).

77. Arch. Cath., perg. 1,356 (Feb. 22, 1279). And see the constitutions of Bishop Jazpert in perg. 289 (Aug. 13, 1277).

78. At the beginning of the Valencia crusade (1230), Barcelona had thirty-seven canons. Vich in Catalonia could support just twenty canons (1246); the papal legate had demanded thirty, but an appeal to Rome led to a commission of inquiry into revenues, and the first number was approved. Majorca in circumstances similar to those of Valencia had its number of canons set at twelve, of which four were priests (1244-1247); there were only three dignitaries (sacristan, precentor, and archdeacon); there was a master of grammar, a subsacristan, two ministers to chant the epistle and gospel on feasts, etc. In the reform drawn by Vidal de Cañellas for the cathedral of Barbastro there were to be twenty clerics: ten priests, six deacons, and four subdeacons; these were to be supported by the episcopal third of the tithes and by a half of the rentals (Ricardo del Arco, "El famoso jurisperito del siglo xiii, Vidal de Cañellas, obispo de Huesca, noticias y documentos inéditos," BRABLB, VIII, 1916,468-469). The primate of Toledo in our period would seek to outshine the other churches; a decree of 1238 called for forty canons and an even larger number of assistants; see Javier Gorosterratzu, Don Rodrigo Jiménez de Rada, gran estadista, escritor y prelado, estudio documentado de su vida...(Pamplona, 1925), pp. 271-273. The statutes worked out for Seville (1261), a city which had been conquered at about the same time as Valencia, projected an ambitious program of forty canons too, including of course the dignitaries; this, like the unusual number of parishes (see below Chapter V, note 168 and text), probably represented an unrealistic appraisal of needs and capacity (Repartimiento de Sevilla, I, 354).

79. Arch. Cath., perg. 4,614 (Feb. 19, 1248): "Dominicus Mathei clericus nobis exposuit conquerendo, et cum olim per capcionem Civitatis Valencie in ordinacione ipsius Ecclesie inter ceteros canonicos ipsum creavimus in canonicum ecclesie antedicte, et ipsa canonia optinenda ad Episcopum et Capitulum valentinum multocies institisse placuit Episcopo et Capitulo quod res in iudicium duceretur et per negacionem re in dubium revocata..."; "per nos fuisse receptum in canonicum Ecclesie valentine in prima creatione canonicorum quam fecimus in eadem." We find Dominic functioning as a canon in cathedral documents of 1273.

80. Arch. Cath., perg. 2,309 (June 23, 1240).

81. Lib. III, tit. XXVII, no. 5, p. 332: "non prosequor quia circa eorum officia et potestates fere quot sunt Ecclesiae, tot sunt consuetudinum varietates."

82. Ordinatio ecclesiae valentinae, p. 250. Each of these offices in the dioceses of Spain during the early thirteenth century is analyzed from contemporary documents by Demetrio Mansilla Reoyo, Iglesia castellano-leonesa y curia romana en los tiempos del rey San Fernando, estudio documental sacado de los registros vaticanos (Madrid, 1945); on the sacristan or treasurer see pp. 203-204. More useful here but more elaborate is the monograph by D. E. Heintschel, The Mediaeval Concept of an Ecclesiastical Office, an Analytical Study of the Concept of an Ecclesiastical Office in the Major Sources and Printed Commentaries from 1140-1300, (Washington, D.C., 1956). Some would, refuse the name "dignitary" to capitular officials who lacked an administrative (especially a jurisdictional) function; a further distinction of "personage" and "office" is provided for the latter.

83. Arch. Cath., perg. 2,309 (June 23, 1240); and perg. 2,310 (June 14, 1242).

84. Arch. Cath., perg. 4,616 (June 4, 1247): "notum sit cunctis quod nos Arnaldus dei gratia Episcopus Valentinus assignamus vobis Arnaldo sacriste Sedis Valencie in tota vita vestra Quatrocentos bisancios boni Argenti rectique pensi racione sacristie Valentine...annuatim super omnibus oblacionibus et defunccionibus Ecclesie Sedis Valencie, et super totam primiciam de Rucafa et de Melilla et de Benimaçot...et super omnibus denariis Censualibus nostris quos hodie percipimus in Valencia." On Melilla, seep. 163, with note 94.

85. Rationes decimarum, I, 259, 264.

86. Arch. Cath., perg. 2,310 (June 14, 1242). Actually one may distinguish two offices here. At Valencia their functions seem to have been combined at first, though later in the century separate offices may have been emerging. The chanter or capiscol was concerned with the organization and discipline of the choir and choir services; the chancellor or precentor (maestrescuela, magister scholarum) provided teachers and despatched documents bearing the capitular seal. See the descriptions in Mansilla Reoyo, Iglesia castellano-leonesa, pp. 203-204 and nn. Even within the office of precentor, one may distinguish the earlier, separate, and noncapitular function of master of the schools; by our time he had long been brought into the capitular body in most places, either by creating the office of scholasticus (magister scholarum, even capischola); or by annexing the function to that of the capitular chancellor (usual in northern Europe) or precentor (magiscola, primicerius, etc.; often in the south). The precentor or chancellor was superintendent of schooling but sometimes be also taught the higher subjects, especially theology. See H. Rashdall, The Universities of Europe in the Middle Ages, ed. M. Powicke and A. B. Emden, 3 vols. (New York, 1936), I, 279-282 and nn.

87. Rationes decimarum, I, 259, 263; this was from his office and did not include, for example, his "portion" from the canons' income. The schools as such were unprofitable, but the Master Vincent who taught there paid 18 and 16 solidi, probably from supporting-rents for the cathedral instruction (ibid., pp. 258, 264).

88. Arch. Cath., perg. 2,408 (June 23, 1260). On the dean see Mansilla Reoyo, Iglesia castellano-leonesa, pp. 202-203. Moreau, Église en Belgique, III, 338-340.

89. Peregrín L. Lioréns y Raga, "El deanato de la catedral de Valencia," ACCV, XXII (1954), 9-11 and 16-17, transcribing the documents from the Valencia cathedral archives

90. Colección diplomática, doc. 918 (Dec. 19, 1265): "dechano, canonicis et capitulo."

91. Arch. Cath., perg. 2,418.

92. Rationes decimarum, I, 255, 262. Apparently his duty was recompensed by an exemption; see p. 19 where the dean of Barcelona is assessed: "quia collector est exemptorum -- nichil." On p. 32 reasons are given for exempting a collector from the large sum of 300 solidi on account of his duties and modest income.

93. Ordinatio ecclesiae valentinae, pp. 233 and 319-320; the sacristan was also instituted (see above p. 57), but is not mentioned in these passages and seems to be a bit later. Quotation from Moorman, Church Life, p. 209. See Mansilla Reoyo, Iglesia castellano-leonesa, pp. 204-205; A. Amanieu, "Archidiacre", DDC, I, cols. 948-1,004; Heintschel, Mediaeval Office, pp. 62-64.

94. Heintschel, Mediaeval Office, p. 62.

95. Arch. Cath., perg. 2,310 (June 14, 1242).

96. Ibid.

97. Arch. Cath., perg. 2,312 (Feb. II, 1243 or 1244): "finem hitibus et discordie imponere cupientes."

98. Rationes decimarum, I, 258, 264. On p. 267 we find him adding 269 sohidi to make good his default in the year 1277-1278; 40 more to supply for what was lacking from a prepositura (see above, note 62) of 1276-1277; and 200 more, apparently also for default in 1276-1277. The archdeacon of Játiva, with the Valencia dean, had charge of collecting the tax and so does not appear on the lists himself except in an appendix for all six years where he pays a past default of 62 solidi (I, 267).

99. For example, the chapter sold the bishop their share of a Roteros (Moslem?) cemetery in Arch. Cath., perg. 1,209 (Mar. 15, 1244): "noverint universi quod nos...non decepti neque seducti, nec coacti nec iuris nostri ignari, libera voluntate concedimus vobis dompno Arnaldo Valentino Episcopo et successoribus vestris totum ius et partem nostram quod nos habemus et habere debemus in illo cimiterio quod dicitur de Roteros."

100. See the agreement of 1241 (note 69) and also the guiatge of King James to the canons and their households, under a penalty of a thousand morabatins for transgressors in Arch. Cath., perg 2,394 (codex, Liber constitutionum, fols. 61v-62r). In the first visitation and organization of the diocese by the metropolitan, the members of the canons' households were declared above the jurisdiction of the archdeacon (perg. 2,310, June 14, 1242). The houses of the canons, numbering eighteen by 1462, kept the same locations as late as 1854; Sanchís Sivera traces each for us in his Catedral de Valencia, pp. 15-16nn. Illuminating comparisons and sidelights on the workings of Aragonese chapters may be found in the article of Antonio Durán Gudiol, "El derecho capitular de la catedral de Huesca desde el siglo xii al xvi," REDC, VII (1952), 447-515. In 1238 there were both canons living in common and prebendary canons with no common life at all (pp. 452- 453). In 1254 the bishop with most of the chapter decreed secularization of the canons' life; but other canons, wishing to retain the rule of St. Augustine, appealed to Rome; litigation was still going forward in 1296. The article also edits the regulations of the chapter (pp. 505-515), ten of the documents being from the thirteenth century. The life and rule of the Tarragona canons, as lived in common ca. 1154, may be seen in the document in Viage literario, XIX, 214-216.

101. Durán, "Derecho capitular," pp. 483, 486. On the various kinds of non-canon personnel see the DDC articles cited above, note 67. The portionarii, for example, had a share of prebendial revenue, assisted at the daily office and conventual Mass, but were not canons, and usually had no voice in chapter.

102. See document cited in Chapter VIII, note 135.

103. Arch. Cath., leg. XXXV, no. 9 (Oct. 1, 1255). Public notaries, like William of Jaca, compose many of the capitular documents; and the revenue document of 1247, cited several times, includes provision for paying a fairly large bill to the scribe Guillonus.

104. Rationes decimarum, I, 263-265.

105. The names are variously spelled, and variously transcribed by authors. Díaz is also Díez, Didacus etc.; Piquer is Pichet; the Bernard, Bertrand, and Berengars are sometimes confused. Oteiza (in the diocese of Pamplona) appears as Ateya, Hoteyça, d'Oteyça, Boteyça, Eteyça, and in similar forms. Targanova (a form of Tarrega nova ?) is sometimes given as Tarazona or Tarragona; Teixidor has him as Carganova once, and Olmos y Canalda as Fayguona. Peter Pérez of Tarazona may have been a canon already at this early date; this would eliminate a "Bernard of Tarazona," who seems to have slipped in because of malpunctuation in editing the Ordinatio.Ralph is of course Radulphus, but sometimes Rodolphus or Roydulfus, etc. Benedict is Benedict Na Reina. Piquer acted as vicar for the diocese in 1248, between the incumbencies of bishops Arnold and Andrew.

106. Martin, Arnold, Peter Dominic, J. Vives, Vidal, Vilar, Targanova, Teruel, "et quosdam alios" (Ordinatio ecclesiae valentinae, p. 233). In 1247 Dominic Matthew succeeded in establishing his claim that he too had been among these (see note 79).

107. Antigüedades de Valencia, I, 214 (1245). Sanchís Sivera, "Arnaldo de Peralta," pp. 47-48, document of July 22, 1247.

108. Rationes decimarum, I, 255-267.

109. The family is from Montpellier, and the name may also be written Za Rocha, La Rocha etc. Documentation on his activities and holdings is abundant both in the cathedral and crown archives. See Miret y Sans's estimate of his importance in national affairs (Itinerari, p. 437) and Ricardo del Arco, "El obispo Don Jaime Sarroca, consejero y gran privado del rey Don Jaime el Conquistador (noticias y documentos inéditos)," BRABLB, VIII (1916), 463-480, 508-521, and IX (1917), 65-91.

110. Arch. Crown, James I, Reg. Canc. 16, fol. 237v (Oct. 25, 1270) for Benedict. On Giles see Itinerari, pp. 270, 299, 410, 437, 485-487.

111. Arch. Crown, Peter III, Reg. Canc. 40, fol. 5 (Aug. 2, 1277); bishop in 1306, in Regestum Clementis Papae V, I, 93, no. 499 (Feb. 17, 1306). And see Chapter V, note 13. Was he any relation to the William Rexach who seized the bishop's castle of Chulilla? The name may also be written as "de Richaco"; see his lawsuit in Reg. Canc. 40, fol. 5.

112. Arch. Crown, James I, Reg. Canc. 28, fol. 32 (May 31, 1271). Also Peter III, Reg. Canc. 46, fol. 47 (Aug. 16, 1280). On the embassy see Llibre dels feyts, ch. 475.

113. See Chapter XV, notes 145 ff. and text.

114. Arch. Crown, James I, Reg. Canc. 28, fol. 47v (Mar. 19, 1272-1273). Romaní was in the Jaca mountains; its lord fought in the Valencia crusade and was rewarded (1259) with the castle and town of Villalonga.

115. Arch. Crown, James I, perg. 1,952 (Sept. 15, 1268): "castrum meum de Alventosa situm in Regrio Valencie." On his career see also the documents in Itinerari, pp. 205-206, 209-210, 213-214, 240, 251-252, 257, 271, 276, 373, 390, 443 (an. 1250-1276). See also Arch. Crown, Reg. Canc. 14, fol. 5 (Jan. 7, 1262), and Reg. Canc. 15, fol. 13v (Oct. 3, 1266). Pope Honorius recalls in 1286: "bone memorie Gundisalvim tunc Archidiaconum Valentinum in Saguntinum Ep[iscopu]m...unanimiter elegerunt," in Arch. Vat., Reg. Vat. 43 (Honorius IV), fol. 176r,v, ep. 173; published in Les registres d'Honorius IV, publiées d'après le manuscrit des archives du vatican, ed. M. Prou (Paris, 1886-1888), cols. 478-479, no. 173. His appetite for plural benefices caused him embarrassment at the time of his election to episcopal office; in Reg. Vat. 37 (Gregory X), fol. 145v, ep. 46, with list; unpublished but a notice is given in Les registres de Gregoire X (1272-1276), recueil des bulles de ce pape publiées ou analysées d'après les manuscrits originaux du vatican, ed. Jean Guiraud (Paris, 1892-1906), p. 164, no. 416 (Sept. 27, 1274).

116. Arch. Crown, James I, perg. 1,267 (Nov. 21, 1251). Reg. Canc. 10, fol. 17v (Sept. 1, 1257) speaks of the "hereditatis fratris Martini quondam Archidiaconi Valentie" worth 2,000 solidi of Jaca. On Martin see, for example, Itinerari, pp. 167, 218, 233, 239-241, 243; and see Sanchís Sivera, Catedral de Valencia, app. B. He received six jovates at Ladea (Feb. 13, 1239). See also the king's memoirs, on the "archdeacon of Valencia" at Huesca (Llibre dels feyts, ch. 380). Should he be identified with Valencian Archdeacon Martin López, holding the office in late 1259 (Itinerari, p. 294)? Archdeacon Martin appears also in a civil document at Valencia in 1240 (Arch. Crown, James I, perg. 821).

117. Arch. Crown, James I, Reg. Canc. 19, fol. 122v (April 9, 1274); in this kind of routine grant the term "dilecti nostri" can be ambiguous.

118. Several times he signs with a mark; an accompanying notation in one document remarks his ignorance of writing (1242): "ea qua [sic] non consuevit firmare propria manu." There are knightly men of his name in our records; but it is too common a name from which to surmise relationships.

119. Arch. Crown, James I, Reg. Canc, 10, fol. 98 (June 29, 1258); Reg. 16, fol. 277v (Dec. 31, 1270). Arch. Cath., perg. 4,652 (Mar. 5, 1272), and perg. 1,343 (Feb. 5, 1270).

120. See too the selection in Diócesis valentina, II, 116n. and 442-443.

121. On Michael see Itinerari, pp. 175, 246, 249, 251-252, 254-264, 266, 269, 277, and 556.

122. Arch. Cath., perg. 5,012 (Nov. 4, 1256): "Castrum meum de Spioca"; "omnes alias vero domos meas et corrallia et casallia et etiam lilas domos quos emi...et cellarium meum...et omnia utensilia et hostilia dicti celarii et mille solidos...et roncinum meum virmillum et omnia arma mea ferri et fusti"; "omnes vineas meas...in melilla et terminus suis"; "de regali meo de rozafa quod pro me tenet Bernardus de rossillione"; "baptizatus meus." Espioca was near modern Benifayó de Espioca (or "de Falco").

123. Is John of Monzón any relation, for example, to the important knight who was bailiff of Valencia for the region below the Júcar? What is the relation, if any, between Roderick Díaz and the baron of the same name? Both Busquet and Boxadós, as well as Boxadors, suggest eminent families in James's kingdoms. Peter of Portugal, who appears only fleetingly, must have been the celebrated prince of that name, so involved then in affairs of Aragon and its frontier, who was son of the king of Portugal, and commander of Alcafliz of the Order of Calatrava (see, for example, the documents of the Itinerari, pp. 78, 79, 96, 99, 103, 104, 117, 123, 124, 137, 160, 164, 169, 172, 178, 194, 195, 205).

124. Arch. Cath., perg. 1,362 (Nov. 21, 1279). Arch. Crown, Peter III, Reg. Canc. 38, fol. 42v (Sept. 30, 1276); see also Reg. Canc. 44, fol. 157v (Oct. 12, 1279). Was he the son of the justiciar Martin or of the earlier justiciar Peter? Martin had among his sons a Roderick; as justiciar of Aragon in 1257 he appears with Roderick, for example, both being associated on crown business concerning Castile. He also had a "P. Martineç, clergue" who may have been our Peter Pérez. But "the son of the justiciar of Aragon" named as Valencian canon in the early Ordinatio ecclesiae valentinae may have been the son of the earlier justiciar Peter Pérez. Nor is it impossible that sons of both justiciars held canonries here. (On the justiciar Peter Pérez see Llibre dels feyts, ch. 168; on Martin and Peter Martin see ch. 402.)

125. Geoffrey Barraclough, Papal Provisions, Aspects of Church History Constitutional, Legal and Administrative in the Later Middle Ages (Oxford, 1935), p. 54.

126. Arch, Cath., perg. 1,318 (Oct. 24, 1248).

127. Arch. Cath., perg. 5,982 (Nov. 26, 1259). This same line of inquiry into aristocratic origins might be carried into the ranks of the parish rectors. Thus, Raymond of Montañans is rector of Alcira, canon of Lérida, archdeacon of Tarragona, counselor to the king, and eventually chancellor of the queen (see Chapter V, note 15). The name is also given as Montanyana, Montanya, and Montaynans.

128. Llibre dels feyts, ch. 515. A baron here contemptuously refuses to receive a charge of treason sent by Prince Peter through Thomas of La Junquera, who was "learned in law" (ch. 511).