Nine judges give Aragon a king, and the losers must accept it

CASPE, Aragon, September 3, 1412 AD — The crown of Aragon has been empty for two years and three months. King Martin died at the monastery of Valdonzella on May 31, 1410 AD, leaving no heir. His son Martin, king of Sicily, had died before him and left a natural son, Frederick, Count of Luna, made legitimate to inherit Sicily and not Aragon.

Six men claimed the vacant crown. Among them were Alphonsus, Duke of Gandia; the Count of Luna; and James, Count of Urgell. So did Ferdinand, Infante of Castile, who governs that kingdom as regent for his young nephew. Only two of the six had claims worth arguing.

The three realms — Aragon, Catalonia and Valencia — came close to settling it by arms. Urgell raised an army, and Ferdinand levied troops and entered Aragon. In 1411 AD Antonius de Luna, a supporter of Urgell, murdered the Archbishop of Saragossa for opposing Urgell’s claim. The parliaments split into rival assemblies at Tortosa, Alcañiz, Vinaroz and Traiguera. All sides then asked for the same man: Saint Vincent Ferrer, the Dominican preacher, as the one man who could bring the parties to an agreement before they went to war.

In February the negotiators met at Alcañiz and agreed on a procedure instead of a battle. The succession would go to nine arbiters, three named by each realm, sitting at the castle of Caspe on the Ebro. A king needed six of the nine votes, including one from each realm, and all three realms would be bound. Caspe belonged to none of them: a walled stronghold of the Order of Saint John where the three realms meet.

Aragon named Dominic Ram, Bishop of Huesca, the Carthusian Francis d’Aranda and Berengar de Bardaxi. Catalonia named Pedro Sagarriga, Archbishop of Tarragona, Guillem de Valseca and Bernard de Gualbes. Valencia named Boniface Ferrer, General of the Carthusians, his brother St. Vincent Ferrer, and Ginés Rabaxa.

The judges were then shut into the castle. They could speak with no one outside but forty attendants, and the drawbridge came down only for the claimants’ envoys. They heard Mass on March 29 and swore on the Gospels and the Crucifix to elect a king as God, their conscience and justice required, and to keep it secret until the day of publication. Each claimant was summoned to appear in person or by proctor, and made to swear to abide by the decision. Urgell came with a large and richly dressed retinue, to impress the judges. Ferdinand stayed away from Caspe altogether.

The hearings ran thirty days. The Count of Luna was set aside first: the judges would not give Aragon a king born out of wedlock, and the antipope Benedict XIII, his uncle, could not save him. Urgell’s side argued that the crown belonged to his family by birth and conquest, and that Martin the Elder had made him Lieutenant-General of the kingdom. Ferdinand is the son of King John I of Castile and of Eleanor, a daughter of a king of Aragon and sister of the dead King Martin. He had also refused the crown of Castile when its nobles offered it to him, because his nephew was its lawful king.

On June 24, the feast of St. John the Baptist, the nine came to the vote. They sat three to a table at three tables forming three sides of a square, and none would speak first. St. Vincent Ferrer, eighth on the list of judges, voted first. He wrote his decision out and sealed it. It said that the vassals of the crown of Aragon “owe allegiance to… Ferdinand, Infante of Castile… as being their nearest male relative born in lawful wedlock”. Five judges signed after him in a single sentence: “In all and for all, we wish to conform ourselves to the vote of Master Vincent.” The Archbishop of Tarragona could not choose between Urgell and the Duke of Gandia, and Guillem de Valseca and Pedro Bertrand preferred Urgell. Six votes, with a judge of each realm among them, met the terms agreed at Alcañiz, and Ferdinand was declared elected King of Aragon.

The nine kept the result secret for five days. On June 29 a tapestried platform stood before the great door of the church here, the ambassadors of foreign princes on one side and the claimants’ proctors on the other. Benedict XIII, who knew no more than anyone else what was coming, chose to be present. The Bishop of Huesca said Mass. Then St. Vincent Ferrer, charged with publishing the sentence, preached on the text “Let us rejoice and be glad and give glory to God, for the marriage of the Lamb is at hand”. He put the two years behind them into one image: “After enduring the most furious storms, we now see the winds calmed at last. Our ship, battered by the tempest, having lost its pilot and its rudder, comes happily into its desired harbour.” At the end of the sermon he read out that the crown belonged to Ferdinand. The judges acclaimed the new king and the crowd took it up.

There were dissenting voices in the square; the Count of Urgell has many followers. St. Vincent Ferrer preached again the next day, asking the discontented to accept what had come about. The oath the claimants swore as they arrived at Caspe has not held Urgell. Ferdinand went on to Saragossa, where the orders of the kingdom proclaim him king today.