James I the Conqueror

Jaime I of Aragon, popularly known as the Conqueror, was king of Aragon, Mallorca and Valencia, count of Barcelona and Urgel, lord of Montpellier, as well as other fiefdoms in Occitania. He was also in charge of setting the limits with Castile for reconquering expansion and promoted the Mediterranean expansion of his kingdom by renouncing his territorial ambitions in the south of France. Next, in this lesson from a TEACHER we are going to offer you a summary about this character, James I the Conqueror whose government occupied more than 60 years in the history of the twelfth century.

Jaime, son of Pedro II the Catholic of Aragon and María de Montpellier He was born on February 2, 1208, two years after his father requested the annulment of the marriage with his mother, but Pope Innocent III never told him. wanted to concede, Maria, who also opposed the dissolution of the marriage, managed to pass herself off as a lover of Pedro and thus managed to stay pregnant.

Jaime, had a difficult childhood, because with only 5 years he was orphaned of mother, and soon after that of his father he also died in the Battle of Muret assassinated by the Templars under the orders of Simon de Montfort, who

he kept Jaime locked up when he was only three years old in the Castle of Carcassone used by his father as a sign of peace so that Montfort would not invade his territories. It would be Pope Innocent III who sent the Count of Montfort to free Jaime and hand him over to the Catalan nobility who demanded him.

After the death of his father and having been held for a time in the castle of Carcassone, Jaime was clear that it was necessary to maintain certain interest with the Pyrenean peoples, although foreign policy and his relationship were tense, over time he knew how to impose his worth before said peoples.

During the first years of his reign, Jaume the conqueror As he is also known, he dedicated himself to subduing the Aragonese nobility, besieging places like Montcada and Albarracín, of which on one occasion he became a prisoner. Once he was able to solve the internal problems, he took advantage of the Muslim weakness after the failure of the Navas de Tolosa to expand his dominions across the Mediterranean. He likewise knew how to face the problems arising in the county of Urgell; All these events were what allowed him to regain the authority and prestige of the Aragonese Crown.

In 1229 he decided to undertake the conquest of Mallorca, seizing the island shortly after, except for a small nucleus that the Muslims managed to maintain in the Tramontana area until 1232, meanwhile what he established was a kind of protectorate in which the few remaining Muslims on the island admitted his authority. As for Ibiza, he gave it to the Catalan nobility.

Once the Balearic Islands were completely dominated, he headed towards the conquest of Valencia inhabiting Peñíscola and Burriana and later Biar and Játiva. Murcia also conquered it, but had to cede it to Alfonso X of Castile after the signing of the Almizra treaty.

The main interest of James I the Conqueror was in the political and commercial expansion throughout the Mediterranean, and he achieved it with the conquest of Mallorca thanks to the naval aid of the Catalans, which allowed him control and establish trade routes through the western Mediterranean, ending piracy Islamic. The Balearic Islands became the intermediate zone for the trade routes between North Africa and Catalonia.

Both in Valencia as in Mallorca What Jaime the Conqueror did was create independent kingdoms and incorporate them into the Crown of Aragon, kingdoms that were later distributed among his children. However, the distribution of said territories, as well as their reorganization, the issues of jurisdiction and right they again confronted the king with the high aristocracy, and not only the king but also his children.

In Aragon, the nobles considered an attack on their rights the fact of turning Valencia into an autonomous kingdom, since they considered Valencia a small extension of his kingdom without more, also the fact of not imposing the Aragonese jurisdiction and the union in the will of Catalonia.

In Catalonia it also produced a certain discomfort in the fact that Jaime ceded Murcia to Castile for wanting to request new expeditions to Andalusia, which produced new uprisings due to the confiscations of funds carried out by the sovereign.

Jaime I of Aragon who always showed himself to be an intelligent and cultured man, all the struggles that he had with the aristocracy he solved them through the Roman legal system, which corroborated the preeminence of the king. He organized the municipal regency of Barcelona and promoted the drafting of the Book of the Consulate of the Sea, a manual on maritime rights. In Aragon, he promulgated in 1274 the Jurisdiction of Aragon prepared by the bishop of Huesca. To Valencia, he gave the Costum, a type of political - administrative order of a corporate nature.

Already in the last years of his life, Jaime the Conqueror, was in charge of organizing two crusades to the Holy Land, in which both failed. The July 27, 1276 Jaime I died in Valencia, reason why his kingdom was divided between his sons, Jaime, who received Montpellier, Roussillon and the Balearic Islands, and Pedro, who corresponded to Aragon, Valencia and Catalonia.

Today the remains of him rest in the Catalan Monastery of Poblet together with other kings and infants of the House of Aragon.