Raimundo Perellós

Raimundo Perellós, Viscount of Perellós, title of 1391, province of Zaragoza, Spain, was a nobleman of the Kingdom of Aragon, Viceroy of Sicily, 1441–1443, and probably, the son of another Raymond Perellós, a.k.a. Ramón Perellós, member of the Council of king John I of Aragon, (1350–1396), who was awarded the title of 1st Viscount of Perellós, on 13 February 1391.

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The political influence of the Aragonese Viscounts of Perellós and Rueda in Italy

This king John I of Aragon, deceased 1396, from the House of Aragón, had one daughter Yolande of Aragon, (Zaragoza, Spain, 1384–1443), married in 1400 king Louis II of Anjou, a.k.a. king Louis II of Naples, (1377 - 29 April 1417).

Most beautiful Yolande of Aragon, according to the French Chroniclers, had been betrothed through Ramón Perellós earlier diplomatic missions in France in 1390 to Louis II of Anjou, she became, supposedly, a Dowager Queen Regent of Naples aged 33, in 1417, and her first male child, who had been named Louis III of Anjou, a.k.a. Adopted king Louis III of Naples, (25 September 1403 - 12 November 1434, aged 31) who died childless, too.

His adoption was carried out by twice married but childless Queen of Naples since 1414, Joan II of Naples, (Zadar, Dalmatia, 25 June 1373 - Naples, Italy, 2 February 1435, aged 61). Although Queen Joan II had cared to declare as her successor Louis III youngest brother René of Anjou, born 16 January 1409, the reality was that young René became effective King of Naples during the period 1438-1442, in spite of dying in 1480, while the rest of the time Naples was a conquered "manu militari" stronghold of the hard and ambitious Spanish Aragonese royal House of Aragón.

The House of Aragón kings of Sicily control on Sardinia and Naples after 1440

Curiously enough, the next Viceroys of Sicily after the spell of local power there by the Viscounts of Perellós, before and after the 1412 pactioned compromises on the Aragonese kingdom succession were: Lope Ximénez de Urrea, Viscount of Rueda, the same title held by his predecessor, Raimundo Perellós, Viceroy of Sicily, 1443–1459, 16 years of ruling, Juan de Moncayo, Viceroy of Sicily, 1459–1463, during 4 years, and again once more, Lope Ximénez de Urrea, Viceroy of Sicily, 1465–1475, another 10 years.

It appears, that the powerful Aragonese family Luna, related by marriages to the Royal Aragonese Crown since the late 1300s and their abiding for supporting the rights of succession on the Crown of Aragón to the Anjou, royal French origins, in Dalmatia, Croatia, Serbia, Hungary, Naples, and, hopefully, Sicily and Sardinia were rather hard to swallow by the new Aragonese Trastámara dynasty issued from the pactioned arrangements at Caspe city in 1412. It was the time to support those Barons and Viscounts willing to work for the new dynasty giving them honors and lands whenever possible.

Rueda is a rather common name in several places in Spain, but Rueda de Jalón had been always a pivotal center to control and to close, eventually, access by the Castilians to the river Ebro, through the river Jalón, whose sources, located near Medinaceli area, a Castilian area, provided water and fodder for the brisky trade outspots along the river, heavily populated by Muslim farmers and Jewish traders and money changing quarters. The Christian Lords of the conquered lands near the Castilian-Aragonese borders had to rely on sharing a part of the agricultural products, grain and wheat cutivated by the Muslim farmers, while iron trade for weapons, cloth, shoes, woollens, wine and artifacts were traded mainly by the Jews. We could speak on a certain religious tolerance but with some unwritten rules on privacy on your religious feelings, too. No bigotry, neither fundamentalists when the swords are used for communal protection also, poor or rich.

Aragonese Barons and Viscounts were thus some sort of "capitalists" being able to fund, if convinced adequately, military campaigns or trade naval expeditions through the Mediterranean, provided the equivalent to the modern words, "profit shares", were around. There were not, strictly speaking, such as our modern words "our country", "patriotism", "allegiance", and so on. Pactioned protection implied duties and rights on both sides of the contracts, written or not, to obtain a higher social respect, and money and lands, not only duties of the weak and rights of the powerful like the modern civilized world of Western Europe today as synthetised by the power philosophers.

The failure of North European conceptions on power relations, be they British, French or German can be seen everywhere around today while the understanding of some phenomena where drought, too much rain, plagues, etc., gave way to "elastic" payments of taxes for instance. You can only have hard working farmers rgrough slavery or conscription, a Bank not behaving exactly the same than a Bishop, administering big portions of Church lands either. Storage of grain for instance, has been always a constant in many "primitive" cultures.

We are tempted to think that these so many years of Viceroy administration in so many places for so many hundreds of years have not been yet properly explained, neither can be understood using dogmatic Marxism or dogmatic free economy thinking concocted at "excellence" centers by thinktanks boffins.

We know that even before the Luna family relatives were purged out of the proximity of power, circa 1410-1415, king John I of Aragon, deceased 1396, sold the area of Rueda de Jalón to Viscount Ramón Perellós, perhaps the son of a Francisco de Perellós, a Viscount of Perelló since 1366 by award of king Peter IV of Aragon and that Ramón Perelló had sold it to Lope Ximénez de Urrea in 1393, getting thus their title of Viscounts of Rueda. He seems to have died in 1404.

It is known than from 1404 to around 1423 the Castle was held by Pedro Ximenez de Urrea y Heredia, 2nd Viscount. Then, from 1439 to 1492, it was held by Lope Ximénez de Urrea y Bardaxí, 3rd Viscount.

By 1488, one of these "Urrea", Lope Ximenez de Urrea y Centelles, 4th Viscount, deceased 19 January 1508, had been promoted that year to Count of Aranda (Aranda de Moncayo), later a most famous family.

During the period 1490-1512 it was held by Miguel Ximénez de Urrea e Hijar, 2nd Count of Aranda and 5th Viscount of Rueda, while in 1512 was held by Juan de Lanuza, finding again the preceding in 1538.

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