While the whole country was a prey to tumultuous passions, factions at strife one with another, civil war raging with all its accompaniments of crime, rape, and ignominy, these nine men—who were held in the highest esteem by all men, not only for learning and experience but also for strictness of morals and blameless life, and who, like Bardaxi, Ferrer, and Aranda Valseca, were among the first jurists of their day—undertook a laborious examination of the claims submitted to them by the agents of the various pretenders. The count of Urgel had the largest following, and if his Aragonese origin and his descent through the male line were taken into account he would necessarily have had the prior claim; but his despotic temper, always apt to choose methods of violence rather than of law, made them apprehensive of a tyrannic government if he were chosen, and the majority of the electoral college therefore decided in favour of Ferdinand, infante of Castile, whose mother Leonora had been the daughter of Pedro IV, and the wife of Henry II.
ARAGON UNDER RULERS OF THE ROYAL HOUSE OF CASTILE
No better choice could have been made, and accordingly the new king was acknowledged by the estates of the three united kingdoms as soon as he had confirmed the rights and liberties of the realm (1412). Ferdinand, who combined justice and clemency with vigour, restored tranquillity and order, and used his power to overawe the malcontents both in Aragon and in the islands. But the count of Urgel could not brook defeat. Ferdinand treated him with the utmost distinction, but in spite of all, impelled by his own ambition and incited by his imperious wife, he presently raised the standard of rebellion. He invaded and ravaged Catalonia with an army of mercenaries which the duke of Clarence had handed over to him in Guienne, but was defeated by Ferdinand (1413), and paid the penalty of his unlawful deeds by loss of fortune and perpetual imprisonment.
[1414-1454 A.D.]
In the following year Ferdinand added splendour to his accession to the throne by a gorgeous coronation at Saragossa. Thus the crowns of Castile and Aragon were worn by scions of the same reigning house, a prelude to the future union of the two kingdoms under Ferdinand’s grandson and namesake.
Through the prudence and patriotic zeal of one statesman and friend of the people, Aragon had passed through a dangerous crisis without injury to her government or liberties. Ferdinand of the ruling house of Castile, after he had taken the oath of fealty to the constitution, which he did according to custom, kneeling bareheaded before the justiciary, was recognised as king of the united realm and received the homage of the cortes. This upright and well-disposed monarch, Ferdinand, conscientiously observed the laws and even respected and acknowledged the excessive liberties and privileges of the rich commercial town of Barcelona on an occasion when it was extremely inconvenient to himself to do so; but he died after four years’ reign (1416).
His son, Alfonso V, busied himself during the greater part of his reign with the affairs of Naples. That newly acquired kingdom in the beautiful country of the Apennines, where a docile people bowed in obedience and submission to the will of the master, and where the senses were courted with a rich, luxurious life, elevated through social culture and adorned with art and science, was more congenial to Alfonso’s inclinations than his hereditary domain of Aragon with its rigorous legal forms and its earnest population; therefore he preferred a residence in Naples, whilst his native kingdom was governed by a regency. At its head was the king’s brother Juan, afterwards Juan II, a prince well-versed in statecraft and sharing, in regard to politics and public morality, the faithless principles of his time. Already as governor and regent he gave signs of that inclination to despotism and tyranny which later on, when he had succeeded his brother on the throne, he openly displayed, so that the estates took care to secure their constitution against invasion while there was yet time.
Spanish Nobleman, Fifteenth Century
We have seen what importance and consideration were attached to the position of chief justice or justiciary of Aragon, the guardian and protector of the laws. To secure the office against violation and despotism of any kind, it was decreed that the holder should retain office for life, and could only be removed by the king with consent of the estates and on sufficient grounds (1442). There was no danger that a legal institution of this nature, standing as it did between the throne and the people, would be diverted against the laws of the country, since the justiciary was subject to a regular and close inquiry into the administration of his office from a committee of the states. Besides this, a navigation law which forbade foreign vessels to ship cargoes in any of the domains under the crown of Aragon was passed in the reign of Alfonso V (1454), an important enactment, which gave a new impulse to the maritime trade of Barcelona, the Catalan capital, at whose instigation the regulation was made. Thus, both in constitutional progress and in commercial policy, Aragon was the forerunner of the island kingdom of Britain.