THE WESTERN MEDITERRANEAN KINGDOMS 1200-1500papacy which he now enthusiastically supported, seems to
have assumed that he could use Charles II as his own agent
in a grandiose Mediterranean policy. He looked forward to
firm Guelf ascendancy, the recovery of Sicily, and the con-
quest of Aragon, to which his younger brother Charles of
Valois maintained his questionable claim.
Mter his release Charles II travelled via Anjou and the
French court on his way to Italy and his coronation at Rieti,
just outside his kingdom, in May, 1289. A theme of moral
reform entered at once into his government: he expelled the
Jews, Lombards and Cahorsins (the bankers from southern
France), all accused of moneylending, from Anjou and Maine
shortly before renouncing the counties in favour of Charles
of Valois, who was thought to deserve a consolation prize after
failing so dismally to win power in Aragon. Tough measures
were also introduced against the Jews in southern Italy, this
time accused of putting children to death in mockery of the
crucifixion, an old canard already denounced by Frederick
II and by Pope Innocent IV. Mass conversions took place,
notably at Trani, and Dominican inquisitors were introduced
into southern Italy. Drawing on French concepts, Charles and
his leading advisers, such as Bartolomeo da Capua, appear
to have reasoned that it was their duty to establish a Chris-
tian kingdom in southern Italy; as well as the political battle
for control, a moral battle, which might even determine
that political one, needed to be fought. A further reflection
of this can be seen in the sudden arrest of the Muslim
inhabitants of Frederick II's colony at Lucera, whose goods
and persons were confiscated in 1300; as well as bringing
much-needed funds to the king, the sale of the Lucerans
into slavery was the fulfilment of old Angevin promises to
purifY the kingdom of its heathen inhabitants.'
Bolstered by papal insistence that the war must be con-
tinued, and by a Florentine Guelfvictory (Campaldino,June
1289), Charles worked hard to recover territories and loy-
alties in southern Italy. The Angevins found themselves
surprisingly well placed in dealings with their enemies; they
- David Abulafia, 'Monarchs and minorities in the medieval Mediterra-
nean c.1300: Lucera and its analogues', in P. Diehl and S. Waugh, eds,
Christendom and its discontents. Exclusion, persecution and rebellion, 1000-
1500 (Cambridge, 1966), pp. 250-l.