THE WESTERN MEDITERRA.NEAN KINGDOMS 1200-ISOOof crown lands, and from other meetings help against Mus-
lim piracy and other afflictions. In 1398-99 raids into north
Mrica, licensed as crusades by Pope Benedict XIII, and in
1403 a treaty with the king of Tunis, helped ease the danger
of Muslim piracy.^1 ~^1
Martin took events in Sardinia seriously. He was also the
first Aragonese king to set foot, though briefly and without
lasting results, in the other half of the kingdom James II had
won: Corsica. The recovery of control in Sardinia warranted
a decision to commission Martin of Sicily, here acting not as
king of Sicily but as an Aragonese general, to invade Sardinia.
The expedition began with Martin the Younger's arrival in
late 1408, and proceeded very satisfactorily, culminating in
victory in June 1409, only to be followed in three and a half
weeks by the death of young Martin, who was a victim of the
widespread malaria with which the island was infested. Martin
the Elder had been pursuing relentlessly Peter IV's grand stat-
egy in attempting to keep the Italian islands securely under
Aragonese-Catalan rule. It seemed at the height of Martin
I' s rule in Aragon that the foundations had been laid for
the integration of Sicily and Sardinia into the Aragonese
federation. But the unexpected price of empire-building
in Sardinia and Sicily was the extinction of the house of
Barcelona: Martin the Younger had no heir, and Martin the
Elder outlived him by less than a year.
THE COMPROMISE OF CASPE
There were no fewer than six reasonable candidates to suc-
ceed Martin, who had not actually named an heir; among
them was Duke Louis of Anjou, member of a dynasty ever
hopeful of a crown and never seeming to obtain one. How-
ever, the most potent were a great-grandson of Alfonso IV
and son-in-law of Peter IV, James, count of Urgell; and a
grandson of Peter IV, Ferdinand of Trastamara, often called
Ferdinand of Antequera after a resounding victory he had
scored against the Moors. James had received a few signs- R. Brunschvig, La Berbbie orientale suus IPs Haf5ides, 2 vols (Paris, 1940-
47), vol. I, pp. 220-3.