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From 1035 until 1479 Aragon was the name of an independent kingdom ruling not only the present administrative region called Aragon, but also from 1137 Catalonia, and later the Balearic Islands, the Valencia, Sicily, Naples and Sardinia. The real centre of this kingdom was Barcelona, since it was the Catalan counts that inherited the Aragonese Crown and not the other way around. Present-day historians, generally Catalan nationalistic, may call the kingdom the "Catalan-Aragonese Confederation", since this reflects the composition of the state, but its formal name was "Crown of Aragon". Barcelona was the center of what was in many ways a Mediterranean Empire, ruling the Mediterranean Sea and setting rules for the entire sea (for instance, in the Llibre del Consolat del Mar, a compilation of maritime law in Catalan).
The country that we now know as Spain spent the Middle Ages after 722 in an intermittent struggle called the Reconquista. This struggle pitted the northern Christian kingdoms against the Islamic kingdoms of the South and among themselves.
In the Late Middle Ages, the Aragonese expansion southwards met with the Castilian advance northward in the region of Murcia . Afterward, the Aragonese empire focused in the Mediterranean, acting as far as Greece and Barbary.
The union of the two territories of Catalonia and Aragon was caused by the marriage of Ramon Berenguer IV and Petronila of Aragon. This merged the County of Barcelona with the Kingdom of Aragon under the name of "Crown of Aragon". Their son, Alfonso II, inherited both titles. This union was made while respecting the existing institutions of both places. This situation was maintained until the abolition of the state, beginning 18th century.
The king James I (13th century) conquered new territories and incorporated Majorca and the region of Valencia to the state. Valencia was made a new kingdom with its own institutions, and so the third member of the confederation. Majorca, together with the counties of Cerdanya and Roussillon and the city of Montpellier, were given to his son James and were named Kingdom of Majorca, but these territories were reincorporated in year 1349.
The expansion through Mediterranean sea continued (Sicily, Minorca, Sardinia). In 1410 king Martin I dies without descendants. This caused that Ferdinand of Antequera, from the Castilian dynasty of Trastamara, was made king of the Crown of Aragon.
In year 1443, Naples was conquered. Later the king Ferdinand II of Aragon recovered the northern catalan counties and married queen Isabella I of Castile in 1479. However, Castile and the Crown of Aragon remained as different states keeping their own institutions and laws.
The Crown of Aragon was abolished after the War of the Spanish Succession (1702?1713).
See List of Spanish monarchs, Kings of Spain family tree and Spanish Empire
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