Empure! Empure! (The Unfortunately Short Story of Ponc and Pere)

[Actinguy]

Count Ponc d’Empuries knew time was short. At sixty-six years old, he had outlived nearly all of his peers, and even several of their children. It was unlikely that he would last much longer. It was time to get his affairs in order.

His biggest affair, of course, was his family. His wife Adelaida and his brother Ramon were both in their sixties as well, and would need to be provided for, should they outlive him. Then there was the matter of his four sons (Hug, Berenguer, Ermengol, and Pere), plus his two daughters (Guisla and Ermesenda)…there wasn’t enough land to go around, Ermengol and Pere were without a wife, and neither of his daughters had ever even had a suitor. In fact, while a man of almost any age could find a good wife, Guisla and Ermesenda were in their mid-twenties…past prime, in many a powerful man’s eyes. Finding a willing and adequate groom for either of them would prove difficult.

Ermengol, Ponc’s 28-year-old intelligent marshal, was the easiest to marry off. His young bride, Eleanor Colvile, was everything a young bride should be…submissive and demure…but she knew more than simply what a woman’s place should be. Eleanor was brilliant at dealing with people. So brilliant, in fact, that after the wedding, Ponc appointed her to be his new chancellor.

Pere, Ponc’s youngest son, might have seemed an unlikely choice as the second-most eligible of Ponc’s bachelors. Pere had trouble opening up with others, always assuming there was an ulterior motive. On top of his lack of social skills, Pere had an even more obvious handicap…he was physically deformed. His upper lip practically touched the tip of his nose…even after 26 years of looking at him, Ponc had never quite gotten used to it. But as diocese bishop, Pere did have a certain amount of power, and so he was the second family member Ponc was able to marry off. Pere’s wife, Heledd, shared her husband’s social inadequacies…but what she lacked in grace, she made up for with her abilities to manage finances. Ponc named Heledd his new Stewardess.

But if Pere seems an unlikely candidate as a desirable husband, the third marriage was even less likely. Ponc arranged for Clotilde da Intimiano…a 16-year-old filled with vinegar and other substances, as the saying goes…to wed his brother, 63-year-old Ramon. Part of the marriage contract required Ponc to find Clotilde a place in his cabinet, to ensure her security once Ramon passed…and Ponc was perfectly pleased to place her in charge of his spy network.

But despite his successes in the marriages of his sons…Ponc could not find even the lowliest of courtiers in the lowliest of counties to marry his daughters, already deemed middle-aged at 22 and 24.

February of 1069 proved a particularly cruel month for Ponc and his family. First Ponc’s wife Adelaida passed away at the age of 69, and then Ermengol’s young wife died in childbirth, just 18 years old.

Determined to not spend his final years alone, Ponc quickly remarried, this time to Ida von Braunschweig, a widow of renown, still energetic and full of life at 49 years old. Likewise, Ermengol quickly wed Gisela von Veringen, a young woman who lacked Eleanor’s tact, but still replaced her as chancellor.

In April of 1069, the Muslim hordes from the southern parts of the Peninsula swung north. Ponc’s liege, the independent Duke Ramon Berenguer de Barcelona, mobilized the army of Empuries along with his other men.

While Ponc was off fighting the Muslims who surrounded the Duke’s castle, his new wife Ida was busy as well…using her feminine charm to finally find husbands for her step-daughters. Guisla finally married Juan de Amaya, a good man from the nearby Asturias de Santillana…and by Christmas, Ermesende had a husband as well. Foulques Taillefer was hardly desirable, but he was better than becoming an old maid.

Meanwhile, despite their valorous attempts, the Duke and Ponc’s men lost the Duke’s castle. Duke Ramon pled for peace, then re-established himself a nearby county, while Ponc returned home to reconsider his family’s future. Though they were all now wed, the fight with the Muslims proved how precarious their situation was. With a Duke unable to protect even his own land, and no King to hide behind, it was time for Ponc to take a proactive stance. He needed to provide for his family. To provide in a way that a mere count could not.

To provide in a way that even a Duke could not.

No. Ponc needed…in his final months…to become King.

He took his son and marshal Ermengol out hunting, where they discussed the plan. The nearby Kingdom of Aragon barely had enough land to house it’s castle, and not enough men to defend it…but if Ponc could take that Kingdom as his own, he might be able to get all of the independent counties and duchies across the Iberian peninsula to unite under his banner, for protection against the evil Muslims. If they struck now, the Kingdom could be theirs. If they struck now, his family could be secure for countless generations. If they struck now…

And at that very moment, Ponc was struck.

By a wild boar.

The boar ripped open Ponc’s left leg…a mere flesh wound for an able-bodied man, perhaps…but Ponc was now 70 years old, and there was no longer any such thing as a mild wound. Yet despite his injuries, he insisted on leading the charge into the Kingdom of Aragon. The wound grew even worse on the trip, but by May of 1071, he led his men in a victorious battle against the King. By July the fight was over, with the King now hiding behind the castle walls. It was merely a matter of finding a way in, and Ponc would be King.

But in August of 1071, Ponc finally died from an infection in his leg wound. He was 71 years old, and beatified. But in his final moments, Ponc bucked tradition…leaving everything, including his future Kingdom, to his youngest son.

The distrusting, hare-lipped Diocese Bishop, Pere.

 

[Actinguy]

By this point, Pere (31) and his wife Heledd (23) had a two-year-old son Guillem…which meant that Pere’s oldest brother Hug, passed over by their father, would likely never get to be King. Suspecting a future coup, Pere decided to give Hug the consolation prize of his former role, the Diocese Bishop.

But while his father’s war had been a success, the siege was not. The King of Aragon had a strong, stone castle...and the county of Empuries simply did not have enough men to take it by force. Pere went to Duke Ramon and explained his father’s plan, and was pleasantly surprised when the Duke agreed to send the entirety of his army to the cause, without claiming the Kingdom for himself. The Duke could see it was a good plan…and also knew that his own ineptitude in his Duchy meant he desperately needed a King. And of course, the best kind of King is the kind that owes you a favor.

But even with all of the men the Duke could muster, the siege was a slow process. In October of 1071, after the siege had been going on for four months, Pere heard another army approaching from the south. At first assuming the Duke had somehow rounded up more men, he was surprised to discover that the army was actually made up of Muslims. But the fight was swift and decisive…and when the Muslims tried two months later to attack again, they were turned back once more.

But a year later, the siege was still ongoing…and with every able-bodied man attacking the castle in Aragon, there was no one to defend the homeland. The Muslims claimed Urgell as their own in August of 1072. By March, reports reached Aragon that the Muslims were trying to take Pere’s fort in Empuries. Leaving the Duke to take the castle, Pere rushed home with only 100 men…and discovered that the Muslims had more than a thousand. Yet despite the odds, Pere’s men were victorious, saving the homeland before returning once more to the castle in Aragon.

But even then, the horde was not finished. They simply moved from Empuries to the Duke’s newest castle in Rosello, which quickly fell, undefended.

With his Duchy now down to a single county, Duke Ramon demanded that Pere give up his county of Empuries so the Duke could take control. After all, it was the Duke’s support of Pere’s mission that had caused them to be routed by the Muslims. But Pere refused…insisting, instead, that once Pere was King, the Duke would be provided for.

Of course, with the former Duke now penniless and the now-independent Count Pere unable to afford their wages, all but a hundred or so men fled the siege, forcing Pere to give it up. He had no liege, no money, no men…and he was literally surrounded by Muslims. The only thing he could do was to pledge to a new liege…the King of France, perhaps…and wait till he could rebuild an army capable of defeating the castle in Aragon.

But the King of France was unwilling to see a mere independent Count of no stature…so Pere was forced to return home, empty-handed.


Only to discover that he didn’t have a home, either.

In his absence, the Muslims had taken the county of Empuries by force, killing his entire family.



And that’s the unfortunately short story of how an old man’s desire to provide for his family…led to not only his family, but the entire Iberian peninsula.