List of Counts of Barcelona

The Count of Barcelona was the major ruler in Catalonia from the 9th until the 17th century.

The County of Barcelona was created by Charlemagne after he had conquered lands north of the river Ebro. These lands, called the "Spanish March", was partioned into various counties, of which the Count of Barcelona, usually holding other counties simultaneously, eventually obtained the primacy over the region.

As the county became hereditary in one family, the bond of the counts to their Frankish overlords loosened, especially after the Capetian dynasty supplanted the Carolingians.

In the 11th century the Counts formed a dynastic union with the Kingdom of Aragon, merging the two realms under a single ruler. In 1258, the king of France relinquished his feudal authority over the County in the Treaty of Corbeil.

Barcelona remained part of the Crown of Aragon when the latter around 1500 entered into a union with the Kingdom of Castile, thereby forming the Spanish Kingdom. The last vestiges of the County were removed after the War of the Spanish Succession in the 18th century.

"Count of Barcelona" remained one of the many hereditary titles of the Spanish monarchy.

In the 20th century, the title regained some prominence when Juan de Borbón, the exiled heir to the Spanish throne, adopted the title of a "Count of Barcelona". In doing so, he claimed a historical royal title without claiming to be the current king of Spain, especially after his son Juan Carlos became the prospective successor of the then-ruler of Spain, Francisco Franco. After Juan Carlos had become King upon Franco's death in 1975, he , awarded his father, who had renounced his rights to the throne, the title of Count of Barcelona in 1977. Juan held that title until his his death in 1993, when it reverted back to the King who has held it ever since. Juan's widow used the title "Countess of Barcelona" until her death in 2000.

List of Counts of Barcelona

Non-dynastic, 801-878

House of Trastámara, 1412-1516

When Martin, the last descendant of Wilfred the Hairy to rule, died without legitimate heirs, the magnates of the different realms of the Crown negotiated for two years until the Compromise of Casp gave the throne to Ferdinand of Antequera, a scion of the Castilian House of Trastámara.

In the Nueva Planta decrees between 1707 and 1716, Philip declared that all Spanish kingdoms and territories should merge into a single, centralized Kingdom of Spain. In Barcelona this was promulgated in 1716. The County of Barcelona became one of the many hereditary titles of the Spanish monarchy.

ee also

*List of Viscounts of Barcelona

External links

* [http://www.geocities.com/eurprin/aragon.html List of Aragonese monarchs]