John II of Aragon

John II of Aragon and Navarre, the Great, or John without Faith According to the Catalan rebels who rose up against him, (Medina del Campo, June 29, 1398-Barcelona, January 20, 1479) he was Duke of Peñafiel, King of Navarre (1425-1479), King of Sicily (1458-1468) and King of Aragon, Majorca, Valencia, Sardinia (1458-1479) and Count of Barcelona, son of Fernando I of Antequera and Leonor de Alburquerque, Countess of Alburquerque. He was the father, among others, of Fernando el Católico.

John II was one of the longest-lived monarchs of the 15th century —his enemy Louis XI of France called him an old “vulpeja”—. He suffered from cataracts for which he was blind for several years, until on October 12, 1468, at the age of 70, he recovered his sight thanks to the Catalan Jew Cresques Abnarrabí who operated on both eyes.

According to his main biographer, the historian Jaime Vicens Vives, «Juan II of Aragón appears as the most powerful character in a century already full of singular political personalities» since «he focused on his person the most burning problems that affected the different peninsular kingdoms: noble subversivism in Castilla, social divisionism in Navarra, revolutionary activism in Catalonia; and in foreign policy, collapse of the potential of the Italian Dominions and aggressive return of the French medieval hegemony. As if this were not enough, the fact of the proposal of the Hispanic monarchical unit is still linked to his person ».

Biography

He was born on June 29, 1398 in Medina del Campo (Kingdom of Castile). His father was Fernando de Trastámara, second son of the King of Castile and who was eighteen years old when Juan was born, and his mother Leonor de Alburquerque, Fernando's aunt and niece of the founder of the Trastámara dynasty, King Enrique II of Castile. He was the second of seven siblings: Alfonso, Enrique, Sancho, Leonor, María and Pedro. According to Jaume Vicens Vives, «the fact that he was born in the heart of Castile and was the secondborn of a secondborn left indelible marks on his character, his psychology and his ambitions. He was a Castilian through and through, linked to Castile by his birth and by his tastes, and also by the material interests that he received in it ».

Infant of Aragon

When his father acceded to the throne of the Crown of Aragon in 1412, by virtue of the commitment of Caspe, and his older brother became the heir of it, Juan, with only fourteen years of age and with the only title of lord de Castrojeriz, he became the future lord of the family's enormous possessions in Castile. On the occasion of his coronation in Zaragoza in February 1414, his father King Ferdinand I granted him the dukedom of Peñafiel, as an expression of his headship in the representation of Castilian family interests.

Shield as Infante of Aragon and Duke of Peñafiel.

Shortly thereafter, following a request by an embassy from the Sicilian Parliament that he appoint a member of his family as the island's new king, Ferdinand agreed to appoint his son John as Sicily's royal lieutenant. At the same time, King Ferdinand arranged for his son to marry Queen Juana II of Naples, who had just inherited the throne of the Kingdom of Naples after the death in August 1414 of her brother, King Ladislaus of Anjou. However, the projected marriage, which included a clause whereby if the queen died before her husband - which was most likely since she was much older than him - the kingdom of Naples would pass to him, ended up frustrating due to the change of opinion of the Neapolitan queen who decided to marry the French nobleman James II of La Marche. Upon arriving in Sicily in April 1415, John met Queen Blanche of Navarre, widow of King Martin I of Sicily and who had held the lieutenancy Sicilian royal since Ferdinand I acceded to the throne of the Crown of Aragon. Apparently, the young Juan, who was then seventeen years old, fell in love with her beauty. However, Blanca, thirteen years older than him, immediately left Sicily to return to her father, the King of Navarre.

On the death of his father Ferdinand I of Aragon in 1416, he inherited most of his Castilian possessions and titles, in addition to the duchy of Montblanch, and left Sicily, leaving the position of royal lieutenancy, which passed to be occupied by the envoy of the new king Alfonso the Magnanimous, Domingo Ram y Lanaja, Bishop of Lérida, and the nobleman Antonio de Cardona. On his return to the peninsula - he disembarked on the beach of Murviedro on September 21, 1416 -, he went to Castilla to take care of the possessions that his father had bequeathed to him. There, he attended the marriage ceremony between his sister María and King Juan II of Castile, held in Medina del Campo on October 20, 1418, months before the king's coming of age was proclaimed on March 7, 1419. by the Cortes of Castile meeting in Madrid. The link between the king and an infanta of Aragon, together with the death on June 1, 1418 of the regent queen mother Catalina de Lancáster, this strengthened the power in Castile of the children of Ferdinand I, the infantes of Aragon.

In 1418, the deals between the new king of Aragon Alfonso the Magnanimous and the king of Navarre Carlos III the Noble came to fruition —counting on the mediation of the widowed queen of Aragon Leonor de Alburquerque— to marry the heiress to the Navarrese throne, Blanca de Navarra, with Juan de Aragón, whom she had met in Sicily. In December of that year, the papal dispensation arrived so that the marriage could be celebrated and the marriage chapters were signed on November 6, 1419 in Olite. In them it was stipulated that Blanca's rights to the Navarrese crown would pass on her death to the son they both had and that if she died before her husband without succession Juan should leave Navarre because "as a foreigner" he did not expect "the succession and inheritance of the said kingdom of Navarre" rather than by virtue of the rights of his wife. However, nothing was stipulated about what role the future king consort of Navarre would have in the event of the death of his wife with children of legal age, which would be a source of serious controversy in the future. Finally, the wedding was celebrated on June 10, 1420 in the cathedral of Pamplona. However, his interests would continue to be focused on Castile, since, as Jaume Vicens Vives has pointed out, "Castilian to the core" "he remained anchored in Castile as if he weighed on his shoulders the sacred testamentary legacy of his father".

The absence of Juan de Aragón de Castilla to celebrate his wedding in Pamplona with Blanca de Navarra, was taken advantage of by the Castilian noble faction headed by the infant Enrique de Aragón to carry out the coup of Tordesillas, which consisted of the kidnapping of the young King Juan II to have him under his control and to get him to authorize the marriage between the infant Enrique and the king's sister, Princess Catalina of Castile. The so-called assault of Tordesillas took place on July 14, 1420, one month after the wedding held in Pamplona.

Juan learned of the Tordesillas coup through a letter sent to Pamplona by the Archbishop of Toledo and immediately summoned his supporters in Peñafiel where he personally went, leaving his wife in Navarre. Next, he ordered the hosts of his supporters to concentrate in Olmedo, where 3,300 lances came. Enrique then decided to remove the king from Ávila, where he had taken him from Tordesillas, and take him south, to the territories of the Order of Santiago, of which he was master. But Enrique's plans fell apart when the king, helped by Álvaro de Luna, managed to escape from his captivity in Talavera de la Reina on November 29, taking refuge in the castle of Puebla de Montalbán. Enrique directed his hosts there but on December 10 he lifted the siege when he was unable to storm the castle and faced with the threat of the arrival of the forces commanded by his brother Juan who from Olmedo had crossed the Sierra de Guadarrama and established his camp. in Mostoles. Enrique then went to Ocaña, one of the fortresses of the Order of Santiago, while his brother Juan met with the king on December 23 to put himself at his service against any attempt to once again limit his freedom, "the estates and the bodies at all danger".

He had an outstanding performance in the release of the infant Enrique, arrested by order of King Juan II on June 14, 1423, as required by the King of the Crown of Aragon Alfonso the Magnanimous, as head of the infants of Aragon to intervene, he obtained the king's authorization to leave Castile and negotiate an agreement with the Aragonese king. The result of the talks was the Treaty of Torre de Arciel, signed on September 3, 1425, in which all the claims of Alfonso the Magnanimous were satisfied, since not only was the release of the infant Enrique agreed, but also he regained his position as master of the Order of Santiago, in addition to the assets and income that were confiscated after his arrest.

A week after Enrique's release on October 10, 1425, she met him in Ágreda, sealing their reconciliation. Days later, King Alfonso the Magnanimous granted him the county of Ribagorza for the services rendered to the family. A month and a half earlier, Juan had become king consort of Navarre due to the death of King Carlos III the Noble on September 7.

King Consort of Navarre

Juan received the news of his father-in-law's death when he was in Araciel with his brother, the King of Aragon Alfonso the Magnanimous, with whom he had just signed the Treaty of Torre de Arciel on behalf of Juan II of Castilla. There he sent him his wife Blanca, the new queen of Navarra, the banner of Navarra and the surcoats with the arms of Navarra, with which he paraded on horseback next to his brother, the king of Aragon. As he passed, they shouted: "royal, royal, for King Juan de Navarra and for Queen Doña Blanca, his wife." According to a Castilian chronicler, "on this solemnity no statesman from the kingdom of Navarra happened, although it was done within the kingdom, and there was time to come. He says that it was done knowingly, because according to their privileges and customs, they would not raise him as king until he first swore the privileges of the kingdom in a certain place, and in a certain way". The coronation of Blanca and Juan would not take place up to four years later. It was on May 18, 1429 in Pamplona and there the Three States swore Juan as king "by the right that belongs to you because of Queen Donna Blanca, our queen and mistress, owner of the said kingdom of Navarre" and Blanca as «our queen et seinnora natural». As José María Lacarra has pointed out, "the Navarrese jurists did not miss the opportunity to specify the rights that each of the monarchs had and the different relationship between them and their subjects".

On November 29, 1425, he was invested Count of Ribagorza in Valencia.

After the signing of the treaty of Torre de Arciel in 1425, together with his brother the Infante Enrique, he led a coalition of the high Castilian nobility that opposed Álvaro de Luna and his policy of reinforcing the monarchy Castilian-Leonese. Meeting in Valladolid, they demanded that the king banish Álvaro de Luna from court. The pressure took effect and on September 5, 1427 Juan II ordered his exile and that of his supporters for a year and a half. However, the forced removal from the court only lasted five months and on February 6, 1428 Álvaro he was already back before the divisions that had arisen in the faction headed by the infantes of Aragon, which had prevented them from taking over the governorship of the Castilian-Leonese kingdom. A few months later, on June 21, King Juan II ordered the infants Juan and Enrique to leave the court: the first to go to the border with the Nasrid Kingdom of Granada; the second to return to the Kingdom of Navarre, because "it was not the honor of any king, that any other king, no matter how close and due he was, would make a home or stay in another kingdom". The Courts of Castile meeting in Illescas in January 1429 approved a tribute of forty million maravedíes to recruit an army to face the infants of Aragon, although the official reason was that it was destined to attack the Nasrid kingdom of Granada. Six months later the Castilian-Aragonese War of 1429-1430 broke out.

Even before King Juan II of Castile declared war on June 24, the royal army attacked Juan's possessions and those of his supporters. On May 29 he took Portillo, a place under the lordship of the Count of Castro, and later he occupied Medina del Campo, Olmedo and Cuéllar. On June 25, the siege of Peñafiel began and on the 27th it was surrendered by its defender, the Count of Castro. The same happened shortly after with the possessions of the Infante Enrique, which together with those of Juan, were distributed among the high Castilian nobility. It was the reward for having sided with the king and his favorite Álvaro de Luna, including the one that had formed part of the faction led by the infantes of Aragon, a fact that was decisive in the outcome of the war in favor of Castile.

The agreement that was finally reached, called the Majano truce and which was signed on July 16, 1430, meant a complete defeat of the claims of Juan and his brother the King of Aragon since their possessions would not be returned to them Neither Juan nor Enrique would receive an equivalent income in cash for them, but only reached the commitment that at the end of the truce that would last five years - period of time during which the infants of Aragon could not enter Castile - some judges would resolve the claims of infants. These harsh terms were accepted by Juan and his brother the King of Aragon, due to his military inferiority.

In 1434 he traveled to Sicily where his brothers King Alfonso the Magnanimous and the Infantes of Aragon Enrique and Pedro were. Although its purpose was to try to get the King of Aragon to return to the Iberian Peninsula to take care of his affairs in Castile once the five-year period stipulated in Majano's truces that had put an end to the hostilities of the Castilian-Aragonese war of 1429-1430, he ended up participating in the naval battle of Ponza where he was taken prisoner along with his brothers King Alfonso and the infant Enrique. They were taken to Genoa and from there to Milan, which then He held sovereignty over the Republic of Genoa. But in Milan, Duke Felipe Maria Visconti did not treat them as enemies but rather sealed an alliance with Alfonso the Magnanimous, whose first concrete result was the release of Juan who on November 2 embarked from Porto Venere bound for Barcelona where the December 30. Shortly after, Alfonso the Magnanimous was released and almost at the same time the Infante Pedro managed to take the coveted Plaza de Gaeta. This success induced King Alfonso to continue in Italy, so on January 20, 1436, he appointed his brother Juan royal lieutenant in the kingdoms of Aragon and Valencia and co-lieutenant in the Principality of Catalonia. The battle of Ponza gave rise to a satirical work by the Marquis of Santillana, La comedieta de Ponza.

While his wife, Queen Blanca I of Navarre, along with Alfonso the Magnanimous, María de Aragón, were in Italy, they managed to get King Juan II of Castile to extend Majano's truces for eight months, which allowed him to negotiate the definitive peace of the Castilian-Aragonese war of 1429-1430, reaching the agreement of the Concord of Toledo signed on September 22, 1436. As a guarantee of this "contract of peace and harmony" the marriage of the Prince of Asturias was established Enrique with the Navarrese infanta Blanca, Juan's eldest daughter. He donated a part of the Castilian possessions that had been confiscated from him in 1430 as a dowry. However, the peace of Toledo did not mention the rest of his possessions that had been distributed among the Castilian nobility.

In the Castilian civil war of 1437-1445 he ended up leading, together with his brother Enrique, the noble faction that had rebelled against the favorite of Juan II of Castile Álvaro de Luna. Although in the first years of the war he forced King Juan II to banish his favorite from court on two occasions, the first for six months (Castronuño Agreement) and the second for six years (Medina del Campo Judgment), He had to resort to kidnapping the king (Rámaga coup) to prevent him from continuing to support the side of the constable. He was finally defeated in the decisive and final battle of Olmedo which meant the final loss of all his Castilian possessions. In the course of the war and to seal the alliance between the infantes of Aragon and the leaders of the noble League that they headed, the marriage of the infante Enrique with Beatriz de Pimentel, daughter of the count of Benavente, and that of Juan, who had just widowed after his wife Queen Blanca I of Navarra died in May, with Juana Enríquez, daughter of the admiral of Castilla.

In January 1450, Juan de Navarra, who was in Zaragoza to preside over the Cortes of the Kingdom of Aragon —he had been named lieutenant of the kingdom by his brother King Alfonso the Magnanimous who was still in Naples— quickly left for the kingdom of Navarra, because according to Jerónimo Zurita, "it was convenient for him to return quickly to Navarre due to the dissension that began to move through the states of that kingdom, wanting the partiality of Prince Carlos to take over the governorship and possession of the kingdom.", as legitimate successor to whom it belonged by right".

Thus, Juan's return to Navarre led to a confrontation between the king and his eldest son Carlos de Viana, the result of his marriage to the late Queen Blanca. Indeed, Juan took advantage of his wife's will by which his son, who as Prince of Viana was the legitimate heir, should not assume the royal title without her consent, assuming only the lieutenancy of the kingdom. This caused strong discontent in Navarre, which led to civil war in 1451.

Civil War in Navarre

The discontent of Carlos de Viana and the increasingly serious differences with his father, led to a civil war between the Beamonteses, supporters of Carlos, and the Agramonteses, defenders of Juan's cause. Both faced each other on October 23, 1451 in the battle of Aibar, where Carlos was defeated and taken prisoner along with his constable Luis de Beaumont. Juana Enríquez, in an advanced state of pregnancy, left Estella and moved to Sos (Aragón), where she gave birth to her son Fernando from her. Determined that her son would be the future King of Aragon, she showed all her aversion towards Carlos, who was declared by her father, along with her sister Blanca, as "unskilled and unworthy of the succession (...)" to hold the government. The Prince of Viana, once released after the Concord of Valladolid, and at the request of the Courts of Lleida, went to Naples in search of the protection of his uncle Alfonso V, who forced his brother to annul the disinheritance.

In 1454, Juan II, was named lieutenant of Aragon and Catalonia by his brother Alfonso V, while he ruled the kingdom from southern Italy and Sicily. In Catalonia, specifically, the new lieutenant was in favor of supporting less favored groups, peasants and artisans, given that these sectors of the population shared enemies with his authority: the secular and ecclesiastical nobles and the high-ranking urban oligarchs who they controlled the institutions and disputed royal power.

King of the Crown of Aragon

Sello de Juan II con las armas de Aragón y de Navarra.

In 1458 King Alfonso the Magnanimous died, who had no direct heirs, and Juan succeeded him on the throne of Aragon. On July 25 of that year, he granted his second son Fernando the title of Duke of Montblanch and Count of Ribagorza with lordship over the city of Balaguer.

The Catalan revolution of 1460-1461

In December 1459 the Concord of Barcelona was signed by which King Juan II of Aragon and his son Prince Carlos de Viana were reconciled in their dispute over the crown of the kingdom of Navarre. However, the reconciliation was only superficial because Carlos de Viana, since his "primogeniture" had not been recognized, contacted the King of Castile Enrique IV to arrange an alliance with him by marrying his sister the Infanta Isabel, who was then nine years old.

In September 1460, Juan II convened the Catalan Courts in Lérida and asked his son Carlos de Viana to meet with him. Once there, the king ordered his arrest on December 2, 1460 accused of treason. In it, Queen Juana Enríquez played a decisive role, who showed the king two alleged incriminating letters from Carlos that Juan II could not verify were indeed his, since at that time he was almost completely blind - he was 62 years old and suffered from cataracts, which years later a Jewish surgeon would cure ―.

Royal Palace of Villafranca del Panadés, restored in 2012, where the Capitulation of Vilafranca was probably signed on 21 June 1461.

The arrest of the prince of Viana caused a deep commotion throughout Catalonia and provoked an unexpected wave of protests. The Cortes formed a "commission" to adopt the necessary measures to obtain the prince's release from which the Council representing the Principality of Catalonia. A group of lawyers ruled that with the arrest warrant for Carlos de Viana the king had violated the Catalan constitutions. Thus, the General Council sent an ultimatum to the king on January 17 and two weeks later agreed with the Consell representant lo Principat de Catalunya to add a new accusation to the king: that of having broken the inheritance law of the Crown of Aragon for not having recognized Carlos de Viana as its "firstborn". an army to confront King John II. On February 19, the General's Deputation culminated the coup by proclaiming itself the supreme power of Catalonia and ordering all the royal officials to obey it.

On February 23, 1461, Juan II ordered the release of Carlos de Viana, imprisoned in Morella, due to the threat posed by the army recruited by the Diputación del General de Catalunya that had left Barcelona in the direction of Fraga. The surrender will be signed four months later with the signing of the Capitulation of Vilafranca in which, according to Carme Batlle, "the oligarchy established a constitutional system: the king could not enter Catalonia without permission from the General's Council and the prince he became his lieutenant here, with all the executive power in his hands". However, on September 23, the Prince of Viana died in Barcelona. The news of his death caused a deep commotion throughout Catalonia, making him a myth endowed with almost miraculous powers.

According to the provisions of the Capitulation of Villafranca, when the Prince of Viana died, the lieutenancy of Catalonia passed to the infant Fernando but given his inability to govern due to his age -he was nine years old- Queen Juana Enríquez would be the one who would exercise the lieutenancy of Catalonia in her name as tutor ―“tudriu”―. On November 21, the queen and the prince arrived in Barcelona, but in the following weeks the tension between the queen and the Catalan authorities grew. The situation became complicated when, at the beginning of 1462, the rebellion of the peasants remittances.

Catalan Civil War (1462-1472)

Plaza del Rey de Barcelona where at the end of May 1462 were exposed the corpses of several members of the Seeker who had been summarily convicted of heading a supposed realistic conjure. This fact is often regarded as beginning of the Catalan civil war.

Faced with the increasingly hostile climate that she found in a Barcelona dominated by La Biga and fearing for the safety of her son, Queen Juana Enríquez decided to leave for Gerona, where she arrived around March 15. While both in Barcelona began the recruitment of an army that was to end the rebellion in Rem and which was also directed against all those who "treat against the Capitulation". The anti-Juanist escalation in Barcelona culminated on May 19 and 21 when six prominent < i>buscaires were executed after having been summarily convicted of leading an alleged royalist conspiracy.

Shortly after the signing of the Bayonne Agreement between John II of Aragon and Louis XI of France ―by which the latter promised to send an army to Catalonia to subdue the rebels and in return the King of Aragon would pay him in two or three years 200,000 or 300,000 escudos, but until the delivery of that amount had been completed, the King of France would exercise jurisdiction and receive the rights and income of the crown of the counties of Roussillon and Cerdagne― and waiting for the troops of Louis XI to penetrate Catalonia from the north, Juan II decided on June 5 to enter Catalonia with an army ―seizing Balaguer on June 7―, which contravened the provisions of the Capitulation of Vilafranca. This was the main argument used by the Consell del Principat, together with its alliance with the French king, to declare Juan II four days later "enemy of public affairs" and "enemy of the land".

In accordance with the provisions in Bayonne, at the beginning of July an army made up of about 10,000 men under the command of Gastón IV de Foix entered Roussillon. On July 23, it managed to lift the siege of Força Vella, the citadel of Gerona where Queen Juana Enríquez, Prince Fernando and their supporters had taken refuge before the siege of the army of the Diputación del General under the command of the Count of Pallars. On the other hand, on the western front that same day On July 23, the armies of King Juan II defeated the Flag of Barcelona in the battle of Rubinat.

One month after the siege of Força Vella was lifted, Gastón de Foix's army headed for Barcelona to begin its siege. On September 9, it took the castle of Montcada and set up its camp in San Andrés. King Juan II arrived there on the 12th, reuniting with his wife and son after almost a year of separation. That same September 12, 1462, the solemn proclamation by the rebel Catalan institutions of Enrique IV of Castilla as the new sovereign of the Principality of Catalonia. Previously, in August, the Consell del Principat had made a decision of enormous importance: to depose King Juan II, his wife and his son.

Mayor of Barcelona Cathedral where on November 11, 1462 the two residents sent by Enrique IV de Castilla swore in his name the Catalan laws.

On September 13 or 14, 1462, the royalist side began the siege of Barcelona but on October 3 they had to lift it due to the failure of the successive attempts to take the city and due to the imminent arrival of the Castilian reinforcements that would catch them between two fires. The royalist troops then went to Villafranca del Panadés, which they occupied and looted on October 9 after heavy fighting, and then to Tarragona, which was occupied on the 31st, becoming from then on "an important base for royalist military and political operations." There Juan II will establish his court and there will be the headquarters of the Royalist General's Deputation of Catalonia.

On April 23, 1463, Louis XI, who had been accepted by both parties as mediator in the conflict between John II and Henry IV of Castile, made public the Bayonne arbitration sentence. IV would renounce the Principality of Catalonia and in exchange would receive the Estella merindad in the kingdom of Navarre ―which Juan II never fulfilled― and for his part, Juan II had to grant a general amnesty and recognize the Capitulation of Vilafranca, on the condition that the Catalans submitted to his authority within three months. Thus, on June 13, 1463, the resignation of Enrique IV as lord of the Principality was officially known in Barcelona.

The Catalan authorities did not accept the offer of Juan II and on October 27, 1463 they offered the crown of Aragon to Constable Pedro of Portugal, grandson of Jaime II of Urgell, the pretender to the throne ousted by Fernando de Antequera in the compromise from Caspe. He arrived in Barcelona in January 1464. Shortly after, Juan II launched an offensive to occupy the eastern part of Catalonia and on July 6 he managed to get Lleida to capitulate.

On August 25, Pedro de Portugal suffered a new setback when Juan de Beaumont went over to the royalist side and handed over Villafranca del Panadés. head of the Beaumontés party that fought against Juan II in the Civil War of Navarre and had been the lieutenant of Enrique IV of Castile when he assumed sovereignty over the Principality of Catalonia― and because of the strategic position of the square. Pedro Portugal described him as a "traitor, thief and perjurer", while Juan II received him with open arms, reconciled with him and signed peace with the Beaumontese in Tarragona on November 22, ending the civil war in Navarre..

Another setback for the "rebels" was their defeat on February 28, 1465 in the battle of Calaf. Later they would fall into the hands of the royalists Igualada on July 17, Cervera on August 14, and Amposta, on June 21, 1466. Three weeks later, on July 15, Tortosa surrendered, with which all of southern Catalonia was already in royalist hands ―the generous terms of the capitulation were similar to those imposed on Lleida―. A few days earlier, on June 29, Pedro de Portugal had died in Granollers.

Anverse of a gold ducat of Zaragoza of Juan II.

After the death of the Constable, Juan II made a peace offer of the same tenor as the one he had just made to Tortosa, but the offer was rejected by the Barcelona institutions, dominated by the most radical revolutionary sector who expected help of the kingdom of France. That is why on July 30 they agreed to offer the crown to Renato de Anjou and he accepted only when Louis XI secretly let him know that he had his support.

Renato de Anjou, who never made it to Catalonia, sent his son Juan de Anjou, Duke of Lorraine, as his lieutenant. In mid-April 1467, he crossed the Pyrenees in command of the bulk of the Angevin army and the On September 3, after failing in his attempt to take Gerona, he entered Barcelona. Shortly after, Juan II's troops suffered a severe setback in the battle of Viladamat. In it, several prominent royalist military leaders were taken prisoner. Crown Prince Ferdinand miraculously managed to escape and together with his father Juan II returned to Tarragona in the squadron that had brought him the previous month. In mid-December 1467 Juan de Anjou left for Ampurdán to complete the victory of Viladamat, seizing the castle of San Martín de Ampurias on April 15, 1468 and shortly after the castle of Bagur.

Juan of Anjou's victories, added to the Angevin threat to Girona, were a severe setback for the royalists. In these circumstances, Juan II had no choice but to seek support in the Crown of Castile, where on September 19, 1468, the seventeen-year-old princess Isabel had just been proclaimed in the Toros de Guisando as heir to his stepbrother King Enrique IV of Castile to the detriment of the daughter of this Juana, six years old. Thus, Juan II sent some ambassadors to Castile who entered into negotiations with the aristocratic faction in favor of Princess Isabel to arrange her marriage with Prince Fernando ―who since June 10 was King of Sicily, having been ceded by his father the crown of Sicily. this kingdom―, which went against the claim of King Henry IV to marry her to King Alfonso V of Portugal. The negotiations were fruitful and on March 5, 1469 the capitulations of Cervera were signed, in which harsh conditions were established for Prince Ferdinand. The wedding was held in Valladolid on October 18 after, thanks to the help of the archbishop of Toledo and the admiral of Castile, Princess Isabel escaped from Ocaña and Prince Fernando crossed the Castilian border disguised as a muleteer to avoid being recognized and falling into the hands of supporters of King Enrique IV.

Imaginary portrait of King John II of Aragon, Manuel Aguirre and Monsalbe. Ca. 1851-1854. (Diputación Provincial de Zaragoza).

In April 1469, the month after the signing of the capitulations of Cervera, the powerful army that Juan de Anjou had assembled in Roussillon advanced towards Gerona but the Angevins did not have to take the city because it surrendered without a fight on June 1, 1469. In the following months, other towns in the interior regions of Gerona fell. However, the offensive of the "rebels" was halted at the end of 1469 due to the shortage of funds from the Anjou and the lack of support from Louis XI, who was busy putting down the uprising of the Count of Armagnac, encouraged by John II.

Given the foreseeable resumption of Juan de Anjou's offensive in the spring of the following year, Juan II convened the Cortes Generales de Aragón in Monzón to collect the necessary funds to continue the war. In the opening session that took place on April 10, 1470, the king delivered a memorable speech that so moved the Catalan (Juanistas), Aragonese and Valencian representatives that Juan II had little difficulty in obtaining large donations. According to Jaume Vicens Vives, it was "one of the most skilful speeches a politician has ever made." And at the same time he reactivated his alliance with Edward IV of England and with the Duke of Burgundy Charles the Bold, to constitute a Great Western Alliance" that would isolate Louis XI of France, his great enemy and supporter of the Anjou in Catalonia.

On December 16, 1470, Juan de Anjou died in Barcelona. He was replaced in the lieutenancy of Catalonia by his natural son, Juan de Calabria, beginning with him a final stage marked by disasters for the anti-Juanists, the defection of important figures, the lack of resources due to general impoverishment and international isolation.

Monastery of Pedralbes, around which King John II of Aragon established his camp at the Barcelona site of 1472 and where the negotiations took place that led to his surrender on 16 October of that year.

At the end of the summer of 1471 Juan II organized a great offensive with the objective of taking Barcelona. On October 18, Girona was surrendered, after which Bajo Ampurdán fell into royalist hands, while in the Vallés region they took San Cugat del Vallés, Sabadell and Granollers, culminating their offensive with the great victory of the battle of Santa Coloma de Gramanet del November 26, 1471. In January 1472, the army of Juan II began the conquest of Alt Ampurdán, which it completed on April 19 with the capture of Perelada, with which it closed the Panissars pass that allowed access from the Roussillon to the rest of Catalonia.

The generous way in which Juan II treated the populations that were falling into his power since the end of 1471 encouraged other localities until then faithful to the «rebel» Catalan institutions to surrender to the royalist side ―«this prudent policy did more for the cause of the king than four well-trained armies”, says Vicens Vives. However, Barcelona, besieged by sea and by land, continued to resist, but at the end of September the city authorities decided to trust the magnanimity of Juan II and on October 8 the Council of One Hundred approved the recognition of the authority of Juan II, which accelerated the negotiations that had been taking place since the beginning of the month. The agreement was reached on October 16 and the generous terms of surrender were included in the Capitulation of Pedralbes. the civil war, although with the important exception of the repeal of the Capitulation of Vilafranca.

On October 17, 1472, the day after the capitulation of Pedralbes, Juan II —“that incombustible, half-blind old man of seventy who had often personally led the troops”— entered Barcelona and was received, according to Jaume Vicens You live, with "true joy" for the people of Barcelona, the same ones who had risen up against him ten years before. The celebrations for the end of the war lasted for the next two days, "forgetting for a few hours, the lost wealth, the ruined industry, the victims sacrificed, the hatred created...", concludes Vicens Vives.

The Last Years (1472-1479)

After the end of the Catalan Civil War, Juan II tried to recover the counties of Roussillon and Cerdanya that were in the power of Louis XI of France. On February 1, 1473, he entered Perpignan, after its inhabitants told him would have opened its doors, while the French garrison took refuge in the citadel of the town. But in April a French army under the command of Felipe II of Savoy began the siege of Perpignan, a siege that had to be lifted in June before the imminent arrival of a relief army commanded by Prince Ferdinand who had moved from Castile and in September the Treaty of Perpignan was signed, which restored the terms agreed upon in the Treaty of Bayonne of 1462 ―the sovereignty of Juan II over the counties was recognized but not he could exercise his authority over them until he satisfied the payment to Louis XI of 300,000 escudos for the military aid he had given him at the beginning of the Catalan civil war―.

However, in June of the following year, the troops of Louis XI, breaking the treaty of Perpignan, crossed the border and entered Roussillon. In December they seized Elna and immediately after began the siege of Perpignan, also attacked from the citadel, which ended up surrendering on March 10, 1475. Shortly after, on April 2, 1475, a six-month truce was signed. After the truce expired, the army of Louis XI in February 1476 he seized the castle of Salses, the last Roussillon fortress that was still in the hands of Juan II. This, lacking resources, could not recover the counties of Roussillon and Cerdanya. It had to be his son Fernando II the Catholic who achieved it a long time later, through the Treaty of Barcelona in 1493. It was also King Fernando II who definitively resolved the matter of the restitutions established in the Capitulation of Pedralbes.

Regarding the remense issue, Juan II rewarded the main remense leader Francesc de Verntallat for his support with a title and assets from the Viscounty of Bas i de Hostoles, but he did not go into solving the problem and both the peasants and the lords they remained on the lookout. Again the matter passed to his son Fernando II who would resolve it with the Guadalupe Arbitration Judgment of 1486.

Tombs of John II and of Queen Joan Enríquez in the Monastery of Poblet.

Juan II died of natural causes in Barcelona on January 19, 1479, at 80 years and 7 months of age and was buried in the Poblet Monastery. His daughter from his first marriage Leonor inherited the kingdom of Navarre and Fernando, son of his second union, who was already king consort of Castile by his marriage to Isabella, inherited the Crown of Aragon.

On his deathbed, one day before his death, he wrote a letter to his son Fernando:

Son, you can already consider at the point where we are, that neither rules nor subjects nor powers some humans, however great they may be, can help or worth us, except that Creator and Redeemer of the world in whose hands we are. And it's this passo that we'd like to have been one of the most tiny men of our regimens and senyorios. [...] Don't you win the world... Always lift up before the eyes the fear of God... Justice over all things be the mirror of your heart. [...]
The regimens and subjects preserve in peace and justice, without prejudice to the next, avoiding quanto to the world podays all wars and discussions.

About his life, his main biographer Jaume Vicens Vives has written the following:

Well, what judgment can we form of John II of Aragon...? In principle, every man is responsible for his actions, and no one can disembark John II of his own faults. His most serious mistakes to history were, therefore, not accepting the secondary role that he had in Castile, being unable to forgive his son Carlos de Viana and rushing into the arms of Louis XI of France to drown the Catalan revolution. Here are three endeavours in which our biographer can be blamed for total responsibility.
Now, every man acts at a given social and political juncture. How many have attacked John II for being a man of iron gloves, for aspiring to command in Castile, for defending authoritarianism in Navarre and Catalonia, for using sinuous procedures, forget the tendency of times, the nourished of examples that approach him in the field of contemporary Western Europe. In this sense it was neither better nor worse than his brother Alfonso the Magnánimo, his nephew Ferrante I of Naples, his rivals Alvaro de Luna, Juan Pacheco, Juan de Beaumont, Luis XI of France and Galeazzo María Sforza, and his allies Carlos the Temerario de Borgoña and Eduardo IV of England. It was that time when, as soon as I would define Machiavelli, the virtuous, allying to fortune, justified surplus, success and glory.
John II had that. virtuous politics.
He lived too much. No one can exceed the limits where a generation finds the cap of its historical efficiency... The fact that he went beyond the age of the men of his time, allowed him to be faithful to his policy and gradually repair the faults committed. Unforeseen circumstances, which would facilitate the attainment of the supreme ideal of his life: the enthronement of the power of the lower branch of the Trastamara in Castile.

Ancestors

Offspring

From his first marriage to Blanca de Navarra:

• Charles (1421-1461), Prince of Viana and Gerona, Duke of Gandia and Montblanch;
• Juana (1423-1425)
• White (1424-1464), married to Henry IV of Castile;
• Leonor (1425-1479), married to Gaston IV de Foix, Queen of Navarre with the name of Leonor I.

From his second marriage to Juana Enríquez:

• Leonor de Aragón (1448).
• Fernando the Catholic (1452-1516), his successor in Aragon with the name of Fernando II and king iure uxoris of Castile, with the name of Fernando V for her marriage to Isabel the Catholic.
• Joan (1455-1517), married to King Ferdinand I of Naples.

Given out of wedlock: From Leonor de Escobar, daughter of Alfonso Rodríguez de Escobar, nobleman of Tierra de Campos, chief warden of the domains of King Juan II of Aragon in Castile:

• Alfonso (1417-1485), Master of the Order of Calatrava, to whom his father granted the Duke of Villahermosa.

From a Castilian lady named Avellaneda:

• Juan (1429 or 1439/40-Albalate de Cinca, 1475), Archbishop of Zaragoza (1458-1475).

From a young woman from Navarra, Catalina Álvarez, from the Ansas family, three bastards:

• Fernando (?-1452), died young;
• Leonor de Aragón (1454?-1508/1509), who in 1468 married Luis de Beaumont (?-1508) II count of Lerín and accountant of Navarra;
• María de Aragón (1455-?).

Succession

Predecessor: Alfonso V	King of Aragon and Valencia Count of Barcelona Disputed with the rivals of the Catalan civil war 1458-1479	Successor: Fernando II
Predecessor: Carlos III	King of Navarre 1425-1479 Iure uxoris with White I up to 1441 De facto since 1441 (1451-1461 vs. Carlos IV, 1461-1464 versus White II - you are. of iure-)	Successor: Leonor I
Predecessor: Alfonso I of Sicily	King of Sicily 1458-1468	Successor: Fernando II
Predecessor: Alfonso de Aragón el Joven	Count of Ribagorza 1422-1458	Successor: Fernando II

In fiction

The character of Juan II of Aragón appears in the TV movie Carles, princep de Viana, played by José María Pou, and in the first and second seasons of the television series Isabel, performed by Jordi Banacolocha.