A Companion to Mediterranean History

146 david abulafia

in areas evacuated by the Muslims, but this was by no means the aim of the expedi-

tion; Sicily was conquered in 1282 in pursuit of the dynastic claims of Constance, the

Sicilian wife of Peter III of Aragon; and Sardinia had been promised to the kings of

Aragon as far back as 1297, even though a quarter of a century elapsed before the

invasion was finally set in motion. Yet, from another perspective, all of this was the

best possible news for Catalan merchants, who had already been acquiring grain in

Sicily and who needed more and more as demand in Barcelona and Majorca grew and

grew; and they also acquired assured markets for their textiles (Abulafia, 2007; also

Abulafia, 1994).

Just as important in the creation of a Catalan thalassocracy was the influence the

kings of Aragon were able to exercise in an area they did not conquer, but whose trade

was dominated by Catalan merchants: the coastline of what are now Algeria and

Tunisia. Here, as will be seen, the Catalan–Aragonese presence was made firm by trad-

ing bases rather than castles. The creation of the Catalan–Aragonese network was a

classic example of a phenomenon described by Sir John Seeley when he said that the

British Empire was acquired “in a fit of absence of mind.” Indeed, the policy followed

after the conquest of Majorca and Sicily was to endow younger sons with these new

kingdoms, while leaving the core territories on the Spanish mainland under the rule

of the king of Aragon. A Catalan kingdom of Majorca thereby came into being,

between 1276 and 1343, encompassing the Balearic Islands, the Catalan territories on

the French side of the Pyrenees (Roussillon and Cerdagne) and Montpellier. Sicily

remained an autonomous kingdom throughout the fourteenth century. Ties of blood

did not ensure peace between these kings of common descent, and merchants too

could create problems when they appealed to the protection of, say, the king of

Majorca after being arrested in Aragonese Sicily and ordered to appear before the

Catalan consul—this happened to an unsavory sailor named Pere de Grau in 1299.

(The role of figures such as consuls will be dealt with shortly.) King Peter IV of

Aragon (d. 1387) did develop a more coherent conception of how these territories

were tied together; he had himself recovered Majorca for the Aragonese crown in

1343, and later in his life he mused:

If Sardinia is lost, it will follow that Majorca will also be lost, because the food that

Majorca is accustomed to receiving from Sicily and Sardinia will stop arriving, and as a

result the land will become depopulated and will be lost. (Abulafia, 1994: 14, 248)

He was well aware of the extremely high cost of maintaining a fleet, and ensuring

that his territories held together depended on various uses of manpower: not just

oarsmen for the galleys built in the great arsenal that now serves as the Barcelona

Maritime Museum, but settlers in towns such as Alghero in Sardinia, where the

local population was replaced so successfully that Catalan is spoken on the streets

of Alghero to this day. The Catalan chronicler Ramon Muntaner opined that,

following the invasion of Sardinia in 1323–1324, “with the help of God we shall

always be lords of the sea”. Later kings of Aragon enlarged the imperial ambi-

tions, to include southern Italy and parts of the Balkans; and Catalan business-

men profited enormously from this, acquiring a captive market in Naples after

King Alfonso V of Aragon seized the city in 1442, whereupon he expelled the

Florentine merchants. Alfonso was ever on the search for funds to pay for yet

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