Spanish March

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Marca Hispanica
)
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Catalan Counties
The Spanish March and surrounding regions.

The Spanish March or Hispanic March

Muslim-ruled Umayyad Caliphate of al-Andalus (the Iberian Peninsula) and the Frankish Carolingian Empire (the Duchy of Gascony, the Duchy of Aquitaine
, and Septimania).

In its broader meaning, Spanish March sometimes refers to a group of early Iberian and trans-Pyrenean lordships or counts coming under Frankish rule. As time passed, these lordships merged or gained independence from Frankish imperial rule.[2]

Geographical context

The area broadly corresponds to the eastern regions between the Pyrenees and the Ebro. The local population of the March was diverse. It included Basques in its northwestern valleys, the Jews of Occitania,[3] and a large Occitano-Romance-speaking Gallo-Roman population (Occitans and Catalans) governed by the Visigothic Code, all of them under the influence of al-Andalus since their lords had vowed allegiance to Córdoban rulers until King Pepin the Short of Francia conquered Septimania in 759.

The Pyrenean valleys started to switch loyalties after 785 (Girona, Ribagorza, etc.) with the construction and garrisoning by counts loyal to the Carolingian dynasty of new outposts and fortresses on bordering areas.

The territory changed with the fortunes of the Empires and the feudal ambitions of those, whether

counts or walis, appointed to administer the counties. Eventually, the rulers and people of the March became autonomous and claimed independence. Out of the welter of counties in the region emerged the Principality of Catalonia
, composed of a myriad of counties merged with the County of Barcelona or becoming vassals.

Counties that at various times formed part of the March included Ribagorza (initially including Pallars), Urgell, Cerdanya, Peralada, Empúries, Besalú, Osona, Barcelona, Girona ("March of Hispania") and Conflent, Roussillon, Vallespir and Fenouillet ("March of Gothia").

The nominal boundaries attributed to Gothia and the Spanish March vary in time, not without confusion. While

Duchy of Vasconia (Gascony
).

Origins

Main article: Umayyad invasion of Gaul
The Spanish March and Gothia.

The Spanish March resulted from the expansion south of the Frankish realm from their heartland in Neustria and Austrasia starting with Charles Martel in 732 after various decades of fighting between the Franks and Umayyads ("Saraceni").

The

Wālis were installed in Girona and Barcelona
.

The Muslim forces continued to raid their neighbours to the north, reaching as far as Autun. Peace was signed in 730 between the victor at Toulouse, the Duke of Aquitaine, and Munuza, a Berber rebel lord stationed in Cerdanya (maybe current-day Catalonia), a region that could act as a buffer state against Umayyad expansionism. The peace treaty was sealed with the marriage of the Duke’s daughter to Munuza. However, Munuza was defeated by an Umayyad military expedition in 731 during another Umayyad expansion.

Aquitaine, including Vasconia, pledged formal allegiance to Francia several times (to Odo in 732 and to Hunald in 736 after being defeated), but remained independent. In 737, Charles Martel led an expedition to the lower Rhône and Septimania, possibly seeing that the Umayyad thrust was threatening his grip on Burgundy, which had just been subdued in 736, but he failed to keep the region.

Both Aquitaine and Septimania were still out of central Frankish control after Charles's death, but Pepin the Short was determined to subdue southern Gaul. In 759, after conquering Septimania from the Umayyads, the Carolingian king focused all his might in crushing Aquitanian resistance to central Frankish power. After a ruthless war of eight years, Aquitainian independence came to an end. Toulouse was now under the grip of the new Carolingian king, Charlemagne, and access to al-Andalus was open for him despite sporadic rebellions in Vasconia over the next two decades (Basques subdued in 790 by Charlemagne's new loyal strongman in Toulouse, William of Gellone).

Pepin's son, Charlemagne, fulfilled the Carolingian goal of extending the defensive boundaries of the empire beyond Septimania, creating a strong barrier state between the Umayyad Caliphate and Francia, besides tightening control over the Duchy of Vasconia by establishing the

Kingdom of Aquitaine, ruled by his son Louis the Pious
in 781.

Creation

The Franks created the Spanish March by conquering former north-eastern territory of the Visigothic kingdom of Hispania, which had been conquered by the Muslims.

The first county to be conquered was

Perelada
) are from 812 but the county was probably under Frankish control before 800.

After a series of struggles the

Ausona) was taken by Frankish forces in 801. A number of castles were established in Aragon between 798 and 802 (appointment of Count Aureolus). After subduing the Basques to the north of the Pyrenees (790), Frankish overlordship expanded to the upper Ebro (794) and Pamplona (798), when Alfonso II of Asturias also came under Charlemagne's influence. Sobrarbe was not incorporated into the March, as it appears later in history and was probably within the area of influence of the County of Aragon
.

The death of Charlemagne (814) was followed by a scene of open revolt and Carolingian setbacks around the Pyrenees. After being defeated by the Moors in the 816

Iñigo Arista, broke away from the Spanish March, with the County of Aragon following suit shortly thereafter in 820. The named Catalan counties - territories used by the Moors to enter and overrun Septimania in 719 – became, at this point, a natural extension of the March of Gothia
ruled by Catalans and Toulousains under the Carolingian Empire.

Structure

The local population of the March was diverse. The majority were Basques and Hispano-Romans (Goths). But there were also Muslims, and Jews from Septimania who repopulated the Frankish conquered easternmost territories of present-day North Spain and a small portion of South France. The area changed with the fortunes of the empires and the feudal ambitions of the counts appointed to administer the counties. As Frankish imperial power waned, the rulers of the March of Hispania became independent fiefs. The region would later become part of Catalonia.

Charlemagne's son

Counts of Barcelona then became the principal representatives of Frankish authority in the Spanish March. The March included various outlying smaller territories, each ruled by a lesser miles with his armed retainers and who theoretically owed allegiance through the Count to the Emperor
.

The rulers were called counts; when they governed several counties they often took the name duke (Dux Gothiae). When the county formed the border with the Muslim Kingdom, the Frankish title marquis (Marquis de Gothie) was chosen.

Borrell II and Ramon Borrell
carried these titles.

In the early 9th century, Charlemagne began issuing a new kind of land grant, the

aprisio, which reallocated land previously held by the imperial crown fisc in deserted or abandoned areas. This included special rights and immunities that allowed considerable independence from the imperial control. Historians have interpreted the aprisio both as an early form of feudalism and in economic and military terms as a mechanism to entice settlers to a depopulated border region. Such self-sufficient landholders would aid the Counts in providing armed men to defend the Frankish frontier. Aprisio grants (the first ones were in Septimania) were given personally by the Carolingian king, so that they reinforced loyalty to central power, to counterbalance the local power exercised by the Marcher Counts.[5]

However poor communications and a distant central power allowed basic

al-Mansur,[6]
although the change of dynasty may have played a part in that decision.

The early

El Gran Carlemany
.

References

  1. ^ (Spanish: Marca Hispánica, Catalan: Marca Hispànica, Aragonese and Occitan: Marca Hispanica, Basque: Hispaniako Marka, French: Marche d'Espagne)
  2. doi:10.1111/hic3.12078
    .
  3. ^ Bachrach, Bernard (1980). "On the role of the Jews in the establishment of the Spanish March (768-814)". In Solà-Solé, José María; Silverman, Joseph H.; Armistead, Samuel G. (eds.). Hispania Judaica I: History. Barcelona: Puvill Libros.
  4. ISBN 9781326118396
    .
  5. S2CID 154531960
    .
  6. ISBN 978-0-521-36447-8
    .

Further reading

External links
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