Montesa

A military religious order established in 1317 in the kingdom of Valencia by agreement of the pope and the Aragonese Crown.

The Order of Montesa was founded as a consequence of the dissolution of the Order of the Temple in 1312. It did not prove possible to transfer the Templars’ domains in the Crown of Aragon to the Order of the Hospital of St. John, as had been desired by Pope Clement V: King James II of Aragon was opposed to the strengthening of the already considerable power of the Hospitallers in his realms. After lengthy negotiations, Pope John XXII largely complied with the king’s wishes in 1317. The monarch had to abandon the idea of a great Aragonese order backed by Templar and Hospitaller properties in favor of a more limited project confined to the kingdom of Valencia. The Hospitallers were ready to contribute to this plan with their Valencian territories (except for the commanderies of Torrente and the houses of Valencia) in exchange for the Templar domains in Aragon and Catalonia. As the central headquarters of the future order, the king offered the village and castle of Montesa on the extreme southern border of the kingdom, facing possible Muslim attacks from Granada.

The new institution was modeled on the lines of the Order of Calatrava, and it was linked to the Morimond filiation of the Cistercian Order through the monastery of Santes Creus in Catalonia. The new foundation was not realized until July 1319, due to all sorts of difficulties with Calatravans and Hospitallers alike. The initial stages were difficult, but the firm support of the Crown was a decisive asset for success. The general chapter held at San Mateo in 1330 might be considered the end of the formation period. The number of brethren had risen to forty. A network of commanderies was given final form; the share of the master of the order was the bailiwick of Cervera, situated in the north of the kingdom near the king’s court and not on the frontier. Although theoretically linked to the papacy, the Order of Montesa was a monarchical foundation, and as such it was an unrelenting supporter of the Aragonese Crown in internal conflicts and external projects of expansion. King Peter IV was able to rely on the members of the order against the rebels of the Union (a noble fraternity whose aim was to defend aristocratic privileges) and in the wars against Castile. King John I found them at his side when the Doria and Arborea families rebelled in Sardinia. King Alfonso V received important help from the order in his

Neapolitan campaigns. This tradition of support to the monarchy continued under the Habsburg dynasty, and the Crown always guaranteed the strength of the order. When in 1400 the small Order of St. George of Alfama became unfeasible as an independent institution, the king had it incorporated in Montesa. The plain red Greek cross of Alfama was added to the white clothing of the Montesan knights from that time onward.

Montesa was the only order in the Spanish kingdoms not to be absorbed by the Crown at the time of the Catholic Mon-archs, Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabella I of Castile. As an Aragonese institution, it posed more difficulties to incorporation than its Castilian counterparts. King Philip II of Spain managed to integrate Montesa into the institutions of the Crown in 1587. The order lingered on into the nineteenth century, when its status was reduced to that of an order of merit. Previously the central headquarters had been transferred to the city of Valencia after an earthquake had destroyed the castle of Montesa in 1748. Nature had forced a move at a time when it had long ceased to have any significance as a frontier stronghold against the Muslims.

-Luis Garcia-Guijarro Ramos

Bibliography

Ferran y Salvador, Vicente, El castillo de Montesa: Historiay descripcion del mismo, precedida de un bosquejo historico de la Orden Militar de Santa Marta de Montesay San Jorge de Alfama (Valencia: Hijo de F. Vives Mora, 1926).

Garcia-Guijarro Ramos, Luis, Datospara el estudio de la renta feudal maestral de la Orden de Montesa en el siglo XV (Valencia: Institucion Alfonso el Magnanimo, 1978).

-, “Los origenes de la Orden de Montesa,” in Las

Ordenes militares en elMediterrdneo Occidental, siglos XIII-XVIII (Madrid: Casa de Velasquez—Instituto de Estudios Manchegos, 1989), pp. 69-84.

-, “The Development of a System of Commanderies in

The Early Years of the Order of Montesa,” in La Commanderie, institution des ordres militaires dans l’Occident medieval, ed. Anthony Luttrell and L. Pressouyre (Paris: Comite des travaux historiques et scientifiques, 2002), pp. 57-73.

Guinot Rodriguez, Enric, “La fundacion de la orden militar de Santa Maria de Montesa,” Saitabi 35 (1985), 73-86.

-, Feudalismo en expansion en el norte valenciano

(Castellon: Diputacion de Castellon, 1986).

Villarroya, Jose, Real Maestrazgo de Montesa: Tratado de todos los derechos bienesypertenencias delpatrimonio y maestrazgo de la Real Militar Orden de Santa Marta de Montesay San Jorge de Alfama, 2 vols. (Valencia: Benito Monfort, 1787).