The Western Mediterranean Kingdoms_ The Struggle for Dominion, 1200-1500

THE WESTERN MEDITERRAI'\EAN KINGDOMS 1200-1500

house of Foix and was not united to the rest of Spain until the
early sixteenth century.) He had no legitimate heirs of his
own. john II's own son Charles ofViana became the focus for
opposition within Catalonia against a new king who seemed
far more interested in bolstering his already powerful posi-
tion in Castile than in addressing the region's problems. The
dangers to the crown were seen in the civil war of 1462-72,
a messy series of conflicts that involved the peasants, the
towns, the Carts and even the king of France, Louis XI,
who invaded the Catalan counties on the French side of the
Pyrenees and supported the claims of Rene of Anjou to
the throne of Aragon. Hi Although Valencia, Sardinia and
Sicily supported John II, this was small consolation: it was
in Catalonia that the conflict was really waged, with the
Diputaci6 of the Carts leading the struggle against the crown,
itself supported by many of the nobility. There were no
winners: Charles of Viana died even before conflict broke
out, in 1461, and was said to have been poisoned. Rene of
Anjou, elected king in 1466, was as short of funds as poor
John, now sick and poor of sight. Barcelona, occupied for
a time by the Angevins, suffered loss of population and loss
of trade, to the distinct benefit of Valencia, which perhaps
was the one real winner. In the midst of these events, at a
time when the king of Aragon was desperate to clutch at any
straw he could find, there took place the marriage ofJohn's
son Ferdinand to Isabella of Castile (1469); this came at a
time when the ruling house of Aragon needed all the allies
it could find against powerful external and internal foes.
And even Isabella was not likely to be much help, sucked
as she was into the bitter conflicts that dominated Castile at
this time. The marriage united two royal figures who had
aspirations to a crown, but little certainty of one.

CONCLUSION

The struggle for the crown of Naples between Rene of Anjou

and Alfonso of Aragon was itself largely the product of the

internal difficulties which were tearing the kingdom apart in

46.]. Calmette, l>ouis XI, .fran II PI la rfvolution ratalanP ( 1461-1473)

(Toulouse, 1903); Hillgarth, Spanish Kingdoms, vol. 2, pp. 267-99.