Ramon IV BERENGER
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Ramon BERENGER's sister: Berenguela OF BARCELONA ( -1149)

Ramon IV BERENGER (1113?-1162)

Name: Ramon IV BERENGER 1
Sex: Male
Father: Raymond III BERENGER ( - )
Mother: Dolça DE GÉVAUDAUN (1090-1127)

Individual Events and Attributes

Birth 1113 (app)
Occupation Marquis of Barcelona
Death 6 Aug 1162 (age 48-49) Borgo San Dalmazzo, Piedmont, Italy

Marriage

      picture     picture     picture     picture
      Charter by which Petronilla abdicated in favour of her son Alfonso II of Aragon.     Alfonso II of Aragon     Alfonso II of Aragon     Alfonso and Sancho, surrounded by the women of court. From the Liber feudorum maior.
 
Spouse Petronilla OF ARAGON (1135-1174)
Children Alfonso II OF ARAGON (1157-1195)
Marriage 1157 (age 43-44) Barbastro

Additional Information

Marriage She was married to him 11 August 1137 when she was just one years old. The marriage was consumated in 1157.

Individual Note

Ramon Berenguer IV (c. 1113 – 6 August 1162, Anglicized Raymond Berengar IV), sometimes called the Holy, was the Count of Barcelona who effected the union between the Kingdom of Aragon and the Principality of Catalonia into the Crown of Aragon.

 

He inherited the county of Barcelona from his father Ramon Berenguer III on August 19, 1131. On 11 August 1137, he was married to the infant Petronilla of Aragon, aged one at the time. Her father, Ramiro II of Aragon the Monk, who sought Barcelona's aid against Alfonso VII of Castile, abdicated on November 13 that same year, leaving his kingdom to Petronilla and Ramon Berenguer. The latter essentially became ruler of Aragon, although he was never king himself, but instead Count of Barcelona and Prince of the Kingdom of Aragon. He was the last Catalan ruler to use the title of Count as his first; starting with his son Alfonso II of Aragon the counts of Barcelona styled themselves, in the first place, as kings of Aragon.

 

The treaty between Ramon Berenguer and his father-in-law stipulated that their descendants would rule jointly over both realms. Even should Petronila die before the marriage could be consummated, Berenguer would still inherit the title of King of Aragon.[1] Both realms would preserve their laws, institutions and autonomy, remaining legally distinct but federated in a dynastic union under one ruling House. Historians consider this arrangement the political masterstroke of the Hispanic Middle Ages. Both realms gained greater strength and security and Aragon got its much needed outlet to the sea. On the other hand, formation of a new political entity in the north-east at a time when Portugal seceded from León in the west gave more balance to the Christian kingdoms of the peninsula. Ramon Berenguer successfully pulled Aragon out of its pledged submission to Castile, aided no doubt by the beauty and charm of his sister Berenguela, wife of Alfonso the Emperor, for which she was well-known in her time.

 

In the middle years of his rule, his attention turned to campaigns against the Moors. In October 1147, as part of the Second Crusade, he helped Castile to conquer Almería. He then invaded the lands of the Almoravid taifa kingdom of Valencia and Murcia. In December 1148, he captured Tortosa after a five-month siege with the help of Southern French, Anglo-Normans and Genoese crusaders.[2] The next year, Fraga, Lleida and Mequinenza in the confluence of the Segre and Ebro rivers fell to his army. The reconquista of modern Catalonia was completed.

 

Ramon Berenguer also campaigned in Provence, helping his brother Berenguer Ramon and his infant nephew Ramon Berenguer II against Counts of Toulouse. During the minority of Ramon Berenger II the Count of Barcelona also acted as the regent of Provence (between 1144 and 1157). In 1151, Ramon signed the Treaty of Tudilén with Alfonso VII of León and Castile. The treaty defined the zones of conquest in Andalusia in order to prevent the two rulers from coming into conflict. Also in 1151, Ramon Berenguer founded and endowed the royal monastery of Poblet. In 1154, he accepted the regency of Gaston V of Béarn in return for the Bearnese nobles rendering him homage at Canfranc, thus uniting that small principality with the growing Aragonese empire.

 

He died in 1162 in Borgo San Dalmazzo, Piedmont, Italy, leaving the title of Count of Barcelona to his eldest son Ramon Berenguer, who next year inherited the title of King of Aragon from the abdication of his mother Petronilla of Aragon (Ramiro II was already dead), and, in compliment to the Aragonese, changed his name to Alfonso and became Alfonso II of Aragon. Ramon Berenguer's younger son Pere (Peter) inherited the county of Cerdanya and lands north of the Pyrenees.

 

NOTES:

1 See Serrano Daura, La donación de Ramiro II de Aragón a Ramón Berenguer IV de Barcelona, de 1137, y la institución del "casamiento en casa" ("The Donation of Ramiro II of Aragon to Ramon Berenguer IV of Barcelona in 1137, and the Institution of In-House Marriage"), published in Hidalguía, #270, Madrid, 1998, p. 710.

2 Riley-Smith (1991) p.48.

 

SOURCES:

Riley-Smith, Jonathan (1991). Atlas of the Crusades. New York: Facts on File.

Villegas-Aristizabal, Lucas (2009), "Anglo-Norman involvement in the conquest of Tortosa and Settlement of Tortosa, 1148-1180", Crusades 8, pp. 63–129.2

Sources

1Weis, Frederick Lewis & Sheppard, Walter Lee, Jr, "Ancestral Roots of Certain American Colonists Who Came to America before 1700: Lineages from Alfred the Great, Charlemagne, Malcolm of Scotland, Robert the Strong, and other Historical Individuals". p 112, 111-26.
2"Wikipedia". http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramon_Berenguer_IV,_Count_of_Barcelona.