Alfonso II of Aragon

Alfonso the Chaste
Portrait from the 12th-century manuscript Liber feudorum maior
King of Aragon
Count of Barcelona
Reign18 July 1164[1] – 25 April 1196
PredecessorPetronilla
SuccessorPeter II
RegentPetronilla (until 1173)
Born1–25 March 1157[1][2][3]
Huesca,[1][2][3]
Kingdom of Aragon
Died25 April 1196(1196-04-25) (aged 39)
Perpignan, Principality of Catalonia
Burial
Spouse
(m. 1174)
Issue
among others...
HouseBarcelona
FatherRamon Berenguer IV, Count of Barcelona
MotherPetronilla, Queen of Aragon

Alfonso II (1–25 March 1157[1][2][3] – 25 April 1196), called the Chaste or the Troubadour, was the King of Aragon and, as Alfons I, the Count of Barcelona from 1164 until his death.[1][4] The eldest son of Count Ramon Berenguer IV of Barcelona and Queen Petronilla of Aragon,[5] he was the first King of Aragon who was also Count of Barcelona. He was also Count of Provence,[6] which he secured from Douce II and her would-be father-in-law Raymond V, Count of Toulouse, from 1166 until 1173, when he ceded it to his brother, Ramon Berenguer III. His reign has been characterised by nationalistic and nostalgic Catalan historians as l'engrandiment occitànic or "the Pyrenean unity": a great scheme to unite various lands on both sides of the Pyrenees under the rule of the House of Barcelona.[7]

  1. ^ a b c d e Benito Vicente de Cuéllar (1995), «Los "condes-reyes" de Barcelona y la "adquisición" del reino de Aragón por la dinastía bellónida», p. 630-631; in Hidalguía. XLIII (252) pp. 619–632.
  2. ^ a b c "Alfonso II el Casto, hijo de Petronila y Ramón Berenguer IV, nació en Huesca en 1157;". Cfr. Josefina Mateu Ibars, María Dolores Mateu Ibars (1980). Colectánea paleográfica de la Corona de Aragon: Siglo IX-XVIII. Universitat Barcelona, p. 546. ISBN 84-7528-694-1, ISBN 978-84-7528-694-5.
  3. ^ a b c Antonio Ubieto Arteta (1987). Historia de Aragón. Creación y desarrollo de la Corona de Aragón. Zaragoza: Anúbar, pp. 177–184 § "El nacimiento y nombre de Alfonso II de Aragón". ISBN 84-7013-227-X.
  4. ^ Ernest Belenguer (2006), "Aproximación a la historia de la Corona de Aragón" Archived 2012-03-20 at the Wayback Machine, p. 26, in Ernest Belenguer, Felipe V. Garín Llombart and Carmen Morte García, La Corona de Aragón. El poder y la imagen de la Edad Media a la Edad Moderna (siglos XII – XVIII), Sociedad Estatal para la Acción Cultural Exterior (SEACEX); Generalitat Valenciana and Ministerio de Cultura de España: Lunwerg, pp. 25–53. ISBN 84-9785-261-3
  5. ^ Cite error: The named reference Previte-Orton825 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  6. ^ Cite error: The named reference Alfonsoprovenza was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  7. ^ T. N. Bisson, "The Rise of Catalonia: Identity, Power, and Ideology in a Twelfth-Century Society," Annales: Economies, Sociétés, Civilisations, xxxix (1984), translated in Medieval France and her Pyrenean Neighbours: Studies in Early Institutional History (London: Hambledon, 1989), pp. 179.