No sooner did Pope Martin hear of Pedro’s proclamation at Palermo and Messina, of the enthusiasm shown towards the monarch by the Sicilians, and of the flight of Charles, than he excommunicated the Aragonese. A defiance next followed between the two rivals; who agreed to decide their quarrel by combat, one hundred knights on each side, in the city of Bordeaux, in June the following year. Until the appointed day arrived, Pedro employed himself in causing his queen, who had arrived from Aragon, to be acknowledged by the Sicilians, and in reducing some of the forts on the Neapolitan coast. Leaving Constanza and his son, Don James, in the government of the island, he returned into his states, for the purpose, as was believed, of preparing for the combat. But that combat never happened, nor, amidst the conflicting statements of historians, can we easily decide to which of the royal rivals the disgrace of its failure must be imputed. It is certain that Pedro caused one hundred knights to be selected for the occasion, and that he appeared secretly at Bordeaux, attended by three horsemen only, and returned to his dominions before the lists were opened. For this extraordinary proceeding he appears to have had sufficient reason. He found that a considerable number of troops were silently moving towards the south of France, with the view, as he feared, of seizing his person. If the Aragonese writers are to be credited, the seneschal of Bordeaux, whom he consulted on the subject, informed him that the field was not a safe one, and advised him not to risk his person. This account is the more probable, from the fact that Pope Martin had previously condemned the combat, and had required the English king, Edward I, to whom Bordeaux belonged, and who was to be present on the occasion, not to guarantee a fair field, nor to be present, either in person or by his seneschals. What confirms the suspicion that some treachery was meditated is that, though the English monarch was thus enjoined not to visit the field, in other words, was given to understand that the battle would not take place, no such intimation was made to the king of Aragon.
A Royal Attendant, Spain
While Pedro remained in Aragon, his admiral, Roger de Lauria, reduced the greater part of Malta (1284). He afterwards defeated a French fleet within sight of Naples, taking the prince of Salerno, the son of Charles, prisoner. The vindictive pope now proclaimed a crusade against the excommunicated king of Aragon: his legate zealously preached it in France, declaring Pedro deprived of the crown, which he conferred on Charles de Valois, who was thus to possess both it and that of the Two Sicilies. Fortunately for Pedro both Sicily and Aragon required other weapons than a furious churchman could wield before they could be drawn from his sway.
Though the same indulgences as were awarded to all who warred for the Holy Sepulchre were promised to such as engaged in this Spanish crusade; though vast numbers, among whom was James, king of Majorca, brother and vassal of the Aragonese king, flocked to the standard of Philip; though that monarch lost no time in penetrating, by way of Roussillon, into Catalonia, at the head of one hundred thousand men, these formidable preparations ended in nothing. If Gerona, after a long and bloody siege, capitulated, the French fleet was almost annihilated near Rosas by the famous Roger de Lauria. The ranks of the invaders were so thinned by pestilence and the sword, that Philip, leaving a garrison in Gerona, immediately returned to Perpignan, where he died. The rear of his army in this retreat was dreadfully harassed by Don Pedro, who recovered Gerona with facility.
Pedro had just despatched his eldest son Alfonso with a small armament to dethrone his brother Don James, as a punishment for the aid which that prince had lent to the invaders, when death surprised him at Villafranca del Panades (1285). In his will he left Aragon and Catalonia to Alfonso, and Sicily to his second son, Don James.
Though Alfonso III heard of his father’s death immediately after his disembarkation, he refused to return until he had dethroned his uncle. As James was not much beloved by the inhabitants of these islands, whom he had offended by his exactions, the enterprise was successful. The dethroned king had still Montpellier, Conflans, and other possessions in France: to these he retired, but they appear the same year to have been laid waste by Roger de Lauria, the able and intrepid admiral of Aragon.
POLITICAL GROWTH
[1283-1336 A.D.]
During Alfonso’s absence, the nobles of Aragon had assembled in Saragossa, to provide for the due administration of justice. Some of them were not a little scandalised that he should have assumed in the Balearic Isles the title of king, since, by ancient custom, it could be assumed only after he had sworn before the assembly of the states to observe the customs, privileges, immunities, and laws of the realm. No sooner did they hear of his return to Valencia, than they despatched several of their body to wait upon him, and to express their surprise at his thus arrogating to himself the supreme power without their formal sanction. He justified himself by replying that the crown was his by right of succession, and that there would be time enough to guarantee the constitutions of the realms at the ceremony of his coronation. Accordingly, when that ceremony took place in the cathedral of Saragossa, he fulfilled the conditions of the compact.[c]