King Pedro III 'The Great' of Aragon and Queen Constantia

[Marengo]

Pedro III 'The Great', King of Aragon, Valencia, Sardinia, Corsica and Sicily, Count of Barcelona (1239 – Vilafranca del Penedès, 2 November 1285); married in Montpellier on 13 June 1262 Princess Constantia of Sicily (1249 - Barcelona, 9 April 1302)

Reign: 1276 - 1285

Dynasty: Barcelona

Predecessor: King Jaime I of Aragon

Succeeded by: King Alfonso III of Aragon

Children: King Alfonso III; King Jaime II of Aragon; Queen Isabel of Portugal; King Federico II of Sicily; Queen Violante of Napels and Prince Pedro of Aragon

Parents Pedro: King Jaime I of Aragon and Princess Yolanda (Violante) of Hungary

Parents Constantia: King Manfredi I of Sicily and Countes Beatriz of Savoy

Siblings Pedro: Queen Violante of Castile; Princess Constanca of Castile, Lady of Villena; King Jaime II of Mallorca, Lord of Montpellier; Prince Ferdinand; Princess Sancha of Aragon; Queen Isabel of France; Princess Maria of Aragon; Prince Sancho of Aragon, Archbisshop of Toledo and Princess Leonor of Aragon

Half Brother Pedro: Prince Alfonso of Aragon

Half Siblings Constantia: Princess Beatrice; Prince Federico; Prince Enrico; Prince Enzo and Princess Flordelis of Sicily

 

[Marengo]

Peter the Great (Catalan: Pere el Gran, Spanish: Pedro el Grande; 1239 – 2 November 1285) was the King of Aragon (as Peter III) of Valencia and of Majorca (as Peter I), and Sovereign Count of Barcelona (as Peter II) from 1276 to his death. He conquered Sicily and became its king in 1282. He was one of the greatest of medieval Aragonese monarchs.

Peter was the eldest son of James I of Aragon and his second wife Yolanda of Hungary. On 13 June1262, he married Constance, daughter and heiress of Manfred of Sicily. During his youth and early adulthood, Peter gained a great deal of military experience in his father's wars of the Reconquista against the Moors.
On James' death, the lands of the Crown of Aragon were divided, with Aragon and Valencia, along with the Catalan counties, going to the eldest son, Peter, while the Balearic Islands (constituted as the Kingdom of Majorca), alongside the territories in the Languedoc (Montpellier and Roussillon), went to the second son, James. Peter and Constance were crowned in Zaragoza (the capital of Aragon) in November by the archbishop of Tarragona. At this ceremony, Peter renounced all feudal obligations to the papacy which his grandfather Peter II had incurred.

Peter's first act as king was to complete the pacification of his Valencian territory, an action which had been underway on his father's death.
However, a revolt soon broke out in Catalonia, led by the viscount of Cardona and abetted by Roger-Bernard III of Foix, Arnold Roger I of Pallars Sobirà, and Ermengol X of Urgell. The rebels had grown a hatred for Peter in response to the severity of his dealings with them in the days of his father. Now, as king, they opposed him for not summoning the Catalan cortes, or assembly, and confirming its privileges.
At the same time, a succession crisis continued in the County of Urgell. When Count Álvaro died in 1268, the families of his two wives, Constance, a daughter of Pedro Moncada of Béarn, and Cecilia, a daughter of Roger-Bernard II of Foix, began a long fight over the inheritance of his county. Meanwhile, a good portion of the county had been repossessed by James and thus inherited by Peter. In 1278, Armengol X, Álvaro's eldest son, succeeded in recovering most of his lost patrimony and came to an agreement with Peter whereby he recognised the latter as his suzerain.
In 1280, Peter defeated the stewing rebellion led by Roger-Berengar III after besieging the rebels in Balaguer for a month. Most of the rebel leaders were imprisoned in Lleida until 1281, while Roger-Bernard was imprisoned until 1284.

Read the entire wikipedia article here.

 

[Marengo]

Constantia or Constance (1249 - 9 April 1302) was the Queen consort of Peter III of Aragon.

She was the only daughter of Manfred of Sicily and his first wife Beatrice of Savoy. Her paternal grandparents were Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor and his mistress Bianca Lancia. Her maternal grandparents were Amadeus IV of Savoy and his first wife Anne of Burgundy.
Anne was a daughter of Eudes III, Duke of Burgundy and his second wife Alice of Vergy.

On 13 June 1262, Constantia married Prince Peter of Aragon, eldest son of James I of Aragon and his second wife Violant of Hungary.
Manfred was killed in the Battle of Benevento (26 February 1266) while fighting against his rival Charles of Anjou, posthumous son of Louis VIII of France and Blanche of Castile. As his eldest daughter she could be considered his heiress but did not pursue her claim at this time.

Read the entire wikipedia article here.

 

[An Ard Ri]

Royal Anniversary - 9th of April,1302 : Death of Constance of Sicily,Queen of Pedro III of Aragon.

 

[Blog Real]

Pedro III gives audience to ambassadors of Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor and Michael VIII Palaiologos, demanding Pedro to intervene in the war against Charles I of Anjou. Nuova Cronica.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/36/Nuova_cronica._f.123r.jpg

Pedro III preparing his trip to Sicily. The king receives the visit of two Dominican friars, envoyes of Pope Martin IV trying to convince him not to sail to Sicily. Nuova Cronica.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/51/Nuova_cronica._f.123v.jpg

Audience of Peter III of Aragon. Usatici et Constitutiones Cataloniae.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/49/Audience_de_pierre_3_d'aragon.png

 

[CyrilVladisla]

In 1282 did Sicily offer the crown of the kingdom to Pedro III because he was the spouse of Constance?

Constance II of Sicily

 

[An Ard Ri]

Following the death of Pedro in 1285 ,Constance became a nun at the Convent of Santa Clara in Barcelona where she died in 1302 and was later buried.In 1835 during the Ecclesiastical confiscations and Suppressions ,the Convent was demolished and her burial moved to Barcelona Cathedral.