[66] See Zurita, Anales, lib. 8, cap. 29,—and the admirable sentiments cited by Blancas from the parliamentary acts, in 1451. Commentarii, p. 350.
From this independent position must be excepted, indeed, the lower classes of the peasantry, who seem to have been in a more abject state in Aragon than in most other feudal countries. "Era tan absolute su dominio (of their lords) que podian mater con hambre, sed, y frio á sus vasallos de servidumbre." (Asso y Manuel, Instituciones, p. 40,—also Blancas, Commentarii, p. 309.) These serfs extorted, in an insurrection, the recognition of certain rights from their masters, on condition of paying a specified tax; whence the name villanos de parada.
[67] Although the legislatures of the different states of the crown of Aragon were never united in one body when convened in the same town, yet they were so averse to all appearance of incorporation, that the monarch frequently appointed for the places of meeting three distinct towns, within their respective territories and contiguous, in order that he might pass the more expeditiously from one to the other. See Blancas, Modo de Proceder, cap. 4.
[68] It is indeed true, that Peter III., at the request of the Valencians, appointed an Aragonese knight Justice of that kingdom, in 1283. (Zurita, Anales, tom. i. fol. 281.) But we find no further mention of this officer, or of the office. Nor have I met with any notice of it in the details of the Valencian constitution, compiled by Capmany from various writers. (Práctica y Estilo, pp. 161-208.) An anecdote of Ximenes Cerdan, recorded by Blancas, (Commentarii, p. 214,) may lead one to infer, that the places in Valencia, which received the laws of Aragon, acknowledged the jurisdiction of its Justicia.
[69] Capmany, Práctica y Estilo, pp. 62-214.—Capmany has collected copious materials, from a variety of authors, for the parliamentary history of Catalonia and Valencia, forming a striking contrast to the scantiness of information he was able to glean respecting Castile. The indifference of the Spanish writers, till very recently, to the constitutional antiquities of the latter kingdom, so much more important than the other states of the Peninsula, is altogether inexplicable.
[70] Corbera, Cataluña Illustrada, (Nápoles, 1678,) lib. 1, c. 17.—Petrus de Marca cites a charter of Raymond Berenger, count of Barcelona, to the city, as ancient as 1025, confirming its former privileges. See Marca Hispanica, sive Limes Hispanicus, (Parisiis, 1688,) Apend. no. 198.
[71] Navarrete, Discurso Histórico, apud Mem. de la Acad. de Hist., tom. v. pp. 81, 82, 112, 113.—Capmany, Mem. de Barcelona, tom. i. part. 1, cap. 1, pp. 4, 8, 10, 11.
[72] Mem. de Barcelona, part. 1, cap. 2, 3.—Capmany has given a register of the consuls and of the numerous stations, at which they were established throughout Africa and Europe, in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, (tom. ii. Apend. no. 23.) These officers during the Middle Ages discharged much more important duties than at the present day, if we except those few residing with the Barbary powers. They settled the disputes arising between their countrymen, in the ports where they were established; they protected the trade of their own nation with these ports; and were employed in adjusting commercial relations, treaties, etc. In short, they filled in some sort the post of a modern ambassador, or resident minister, at a period when this functionary was only employed on extraordinary occasions.
[73] Macpherson, Annals of Commerce, (London, 1825,) vol. i. p. 655.—The woollen manufacture constituted the principal staple of Barcelona. (Capmany, Mem. de Barcelona, tom. i. p. 241.) The English sovereigns encouraged the Catalan traders by considerable immunities to frequent their ports during the fourteenth century. Macpherson, ubi supra, pp. 502, 551, 588.
[74] Heeren, Essai sur l'Influence des Croisades, traduit par Villers, (Paris, 1808,) p. 376.—Capmany, Mem. de Barcelona, tom. i. p. 213, also pp. 170-180.—Capmany fixes the date of the publication of the Consulado del Mar at the middle of the thirteenth century, under James I. He discusses and refutes the claims of the Pisans to precedence in this codification. See his Preliminary Discourse to the Costumbres Maritimas de Barcelona.