The Peguera, lords of Torrelles

Foix castle appears for the first time in 984, as the boundary of an allod belonging to Sendred de Gurb,984 and in 1067 it appears again as the boundary of Pontons castle, in the sale that Bernat Oleguer makes to the Count of Barcelona.1067

In the 12th century it belongs to Bernat Marcús, a burgher of Barcelona and councillor to Ramon Berenguer IV, who died in 1166. In 1172 it belongs to Guillem de Bell-lloc, who also holds Font-rubí and Subirats. In 1198, Guillem de la Granada bequeaths it by will to Guillem de Tarragona, leaving money for the executors to build a church there.GEC

On 5 August 1230, Guillem de Tarragona makes his will and, as lord of Foix castle, confirms to Santes Creus the quadres of Albareda, Dosrius, Mussarra and Daques. The castle does not pass to the monastery.1230

By 1262 Foix castle already belongs to the Cervelló family: the will of Guillem de Cervelló, dated 3 May, groups it together with Cervelló, Vilademàger, Miralles and Santa Perpètua.1262 In 1269 the same Guillem bequeaths them to his son Guerau.1269 They remain there until 1381, when a boundary ruling against the abbot of Santes Creus states that Guerau de Cervelló is its owner and that his brother Guillemonet holds and possesses it.1381

Only the published part of that 1381 ruling was known. The Pontons cartulary preserves the full record of execution, which states where the boundary line ran, marker by marker, and, in passing, that in August 1381 whoever held Foix castle was domiciled at the place of Torrelles.1381 The same volume documents the area of Foix as a boundary marker as early as 1188.1188 All of this is in the research La ratlla de ponent.

The chronology presents an open question: the Catalunya Romànica states that in 1370 the area passes to royal jurisdiction.1370 On 18 July 1380, however, a Guillem de Cervelló issues a document dated at the Castell de Torrelles de Foix.1380 One possible explanation is the distinction between royal jurisdiction and seigneurial domain; this interpretation requires documentary verification.

What is dated precisely is the sale. On 2 May 1388, King Joan I and Queen Violant sell the castle, the town and the area of Torrelles and Foix to Bernat de Pinós, doctor of law and citizen of Barcelona, with full civil and criminal jurisdiction.1388

The purchaser is a Barcelona jurist who acquires the lordship through a purchase. Ten years later, in 1398, that same Bernat de Pinós buys a censal with a pension of 2,000 sous from the universitat of Vilafranca for 44,000 sous.1398

Sixty years after the sale, representatives of the area lodge a complaint. The complaint reaches Maria de Castella, wife of Alfons el Magnànim and his lieutenant general in Catalonia while he was in Naples, and the queen writes to a nobleman.1448

Bernat de Pinós gives the castle to his son Roger de Pinós. Afterwards, a collateral successor takes the title of lady of Foix and Torrelles: Agraïda de Vilafranca, married to Guerau Gilabert de Cruïlles, lord of Riudarenes. The daughter of this marriage, Maria Agraïda de Cruïlles i de Vilafranca, lady of Foix and of the quadra of Torrelles, marries a Peguera.GEC

The name of that Peguera is not certain. The Gran Enciclopèdia Catalana gives it two ways, Guillem in the entry on the lineage and Guerau in the entry on the municipality, both times with the second surname de Montbui.GEC The only primary source we have of the marriage is a parchment from 7 August 1484, where the couple sell censals to a merchant from Vilafranca for 19,106 sous and 4 diners and where he appears as Gerard de Peguera, knight, with his wife Grahida.1484

Where they came from is known: from a son of Bernat de Peguera i de Rajadell, of the Manresa line of the Peguera, which begins at Peguera castle in Fígols, in the Berguedà. The Peguera's connection with the Penedès is established through marriage.GEC

Eleven survive from the lordship of Foix and Torrelles, all at the Arxiu Comarcal de l'Alt Penedès. The first is from 1536, by Lluís de Peguera, before notary Joan Llopis. The one from 1579-1580, by Guerau de Peguera, is titled Original capbreu de la vila de Torrelles y terme y castell de nostra senyora de Foix y terme de Sacabechs, made by notary Antoni Martí, with 170 folios on parchment. Then come those from 1625-1629, from 1700 (326 folios, with an index), from 1732-1735, from 1757-1758 and from 1770-1794.1536

The activity of the notary behind the first capbreu is also documented in other deeds. Six years earlier, on 14 September 1530, the same Joan Llopis recorded in Torrelles a settlement between two farmers, with the clause Actum est hoc in villa de Torrellis, termini castri de Fuxo.1530 35 volumes survive from that notary, from 1510 to 1553, in the same archive.1510

Other acts make it possible to follow the exercise of the seigneurial rights. In 1591 Lluís de Peguera ratifies the sale of a plot of land in Fontpregona made by Antoni Ferrer, of the mas de les Torres, and in 1620 Guerau de Peguera ratifies the sale of twenty jornals in the same place by the Ferrer brothers of Torres de Dalt.1591 In March 1593 licence is granted to bless the bell of the chapel of Nostra Senyora del Roser at Torrelles castle, described there as "aleshores recentment obrada al pati"; on 26 May 1693 the visitor authorises the opening of a door to make a vestry there.1593 And in 1603 the vicar general gives licence for mass to be said there at the request of don Lluís de Peguera.1603

The area also grows. Between 1203 and 1230 Santes Creus had gathered the quadres of Albareda, Dosrius, Daques and Mussarra, and in the first quarter of the 17th century it sells all four to the lord of Torrelles castle. Fort i Cogul gives the reasons: the lawsuits with that lord, how little they yielded and the money from the sale.1625

On 29 November 1623, at the place of Torrelles, in the area of Santa Maria de Foix castle, Joan Morgades, farmer, and Àngela, his wife, together with Joan Morgades the son and Margarida, his wife, sell to Pere Morgades, farmer, for thirty pounds, a plot of land at the place called la Serra de Coll Beix, part of a larger plot of four jornals. The notary is Antoni Martí, of Vilafranca del Penedès. The document is a parchment now in private hands, which the association photographed on 11 September 2026.1623

The ratification is not an isolated case. In 1620 the same Guerau had already ratified a sale of the area with power of attorney from his mother, dona Joana, and in 1591 Lluís de Peguera had done the same, always at the foot of the same parchment and not through a separate act.1591 The 1623 parchment is one more example of this.

The notary, at least, is known. Antoni Martí has 66 volumes of protocols, from 1575 to 1651, in the Vilafranca notarial district collection of the Arxiu Comarcal de l'Alt Penedès. The original of this sale must be there, along with the price, the buyer and all the other sales in the area from those years.1510

The conflict does not begin when we thought. On 14 June 1669, the Royal Audience had already issued a writ of maintenance in favour of Guerau de Peguera against the corporation of the town of Torrelles de Foix and Secabecs, later confirmed on appeal before senator Francesc de Portell.1669

Thirty years later, the village tries again. On 10 October 1698 the corporation brings the case. On 24 October, don Garau de Peguera argues that, as lord with full jurisdiction, he must be upheld in his right to issue proclamations banning hunting and fishing throughout the municipal area and along the stream, "from the pool of les Dous to the pool of Joan Font".1699 On 9 December the corporation asks for the opposite: the freedom to hunt throughout the municipal area and fish throughout the stream, any kind of game or fish, except during the breeding season.

The whole lawsuit hinges on the interpretation of two words in the 1388 deed, venationibus et piscationibus. Peguera argued that they gave him the exclusive right to hunt and fish throughout the municipal area forever; the village, that regalian rights are not ceded unless expressly stated.1388 And in paragraph 27 of its reply, the village demolishes the other side's figure: of all the distraints Peguera claimed to have made, only two were proven.

In 1744, forty-five years later, Barcelona lawyers were still citing the Torrelles case as established doctrine on whether a lord may forbid hunting and fishing to his vassals.1669 The Torrelles case therefore had an impact on legal doctrine.

From 1563 to 1713 the Pegueras attend the Corts of the Principality as señores de Torrelles y de Foix. Guerau de Peguera i de Ferrer appears at the Corts of Montsó in 1563, his son in 1599, and that son's son in 1626, the latter as protector of the Military Estate. At the same 1626 Corts is his brother, Lluís de Peguera i de Llaudes, a Knight of Santiago and camp master.1563

On 3 January 1711, Guerau de Peguera i de Berardo, lord of Torrelles and Foix, obtains the title of Marquis of Foix from Archduke Charles III of Austria.1711 The grant reflects the family's ties to the Habsburg cause.

His son Antoni de Peguera i d'Aimeric (1682-1707) was a founding member of the Acadèmia dels Desconfiats in 1700, conspired in 1704, fled to Vienna, negotiated and signed the Pact of Genoa in 1705, was the first colonel of the Guàrdies Catalanes regiment, and defended Barcelona during the 1706 siege. He died in Valencia in 1707.GEC Another son, Lluís de Peguera i d'Aimeric, was a page to the archduke king, who granted him the county of Peguera in 1708, and died fighting. The place of his death is uncertain: some sources say Gurb, in Osona, others Gurp de la Conca, in the Pallars Jussà.1707 He is buried at Santa Maria de Foix. In 1767 his nephew Ramon still calls him «Count of Peguera», and endows an anniversary mass for him, every 2 May, in the chapel of the castle of Torrelles.1767

The third, Josep Francesc de Peguera i d'Aimeric, second Marquis of Foix and Baron of Montnegre, defended Barcelona in 1714 and was wounded. He made his will on 17 September 1746.GEC

Philip V did not recognise the archduke's titles. Guerau's estate was confiscated and his title was burned.GEC According to Albert Parellada, arrested in 1715, he died a prisoner in Pamplona, and his grandson Ramon had his remains moved to Foix.1874 After that we have found no document in which the family calls itself marquises of Foix. In the 1764 lawsuit over the barony of Rocafort, their attorney calls Ramon and Gertrudis de Peguera «Barones de Rocafort».1764 And in his will of 1767, Ramon calls himself «Baron of Rocafort and Lord of Torrelles de Foix».1767

There were three candidate dates for the title on the table: 1706, 1710 and 1711. Three of the four sources trace back to the same place, Armand de Fluvià, and the date he gives with the document in hand is 3 January 1711.1563 This date is adopted on the strength of the documentary reference identified, while recording the bibliographical variants.

On 3 August 1722, the parish priest Diego Hortiz wanted to secure a burial place for himself and his successors inside the church of Santa Maria de Foix. The Pegueras opposed it. The bishop's ordinary court of Barcelona upheld the priest on 3 October 1722, and on 16 December 1726 the Metropolitan Curia of Tarragona overturned it on appeal.1726

The same lawsuit describes the lords' tomb: a large sepulchre in the floor, with the family's coat of arms and a crypt dug out beneath. Forty years later it was still in use: in 1767 Ramon de Peguera, son of Josep, asks in his will to be buried at Santa Maria de Foix, «in the vault of my parents and forebears».1767

The Mapa de Patrimoni Cultural places the remains of Antoni Maria de Peguera i de Pedrolo, who died aged eighteen, in a collective tomb at the foot of the main altar, with a manuscript recording his name and age. The slab bearing the Peguera coat of arms, found and repositioned in 1985, marks an ossuary in front of the presbytery. It must be distinguished from the medieval sarcophagus front belonging to the Cervelló family, decorated with deer. The current location of Antoni Maria's manuscript remains unknown.Heritage

The value of the printed document also lies in the documents it incorporates. The parties submitted testimony drawn from the parish archive. That archive burned in 1936. Inside are burial records from 1608 to 1659 with the names of villagers, taken from books that no longer exist.1726 They have not yet been transcribed.

Those are also the years when work is carried out on the castle house. In 1720 and 1723, Maria d'Aimeric, by then a widow of the first marquis, who died a prisoner in Pamplona, requests a building licence from the Reial Patrimoni.1720

In 1742, Ramon de Peguera i de Berart marries Gertrudis d'Armengol i de Despujol, daughter of the Baron of Rocafort de Queralt.1742 They were second cousins: their grandmothers, Maria d'Aymerich and Gertrudis d'Aymerich, were sisters. Bernat d'Aymerich's 1702 will names his daughters Maria and Gertrudis together with their husbands, Grau de Paguera and Antoni d'Armengol.1702 Anna d'Aymerich's 1724 will explicitly says that Maria de Paguera and Gertrudis d'Armengol were «germanas mias».1724 The Castelló lawsuit confirms the three sisters and their parentage;1744 the link to Paguera is already explicit in the 1702 will. The spouses who married in 1742 descended from these sisters:

Their fathers, Josep Francesc and Antoni, were first cousins; their children, Ramon and Gertrudis, were second cousins. This relationship is deduced from the parentage in the wills, not from a sentence calling the spouses “cousins”. The Barcelona dispensations index records a 28 January 1679 file for Grau de Paguera and Maria d'Aymerich in Barcelona, but does not give the wedding date; Antoni and Gertrudis's marriage contracts date from 20 April 1689.16792006 The published genealogical evidence consists of Lladonosa's transcriptions (2021); the two original notarial registers have not yet been checked directly.17021724

The title of Rocafort did not pass to the Peguera family in 1742: Gertrudis's father remained baron until his death in 1764, after which her uncle, Manuel d'Armengol, disputed the succession. The lawsuit ran from 1764 to 1766, and the lordship eventually passed to Gertrudis and, through her, to the Peguera family.1764 The barony is not from the municipal area, it comes from the Conca de Barberà,2006 but it is the title under which the lords of Torrelles are named throughout the 19th century, and that is why the Muntanya del Baró in the municipal area has that name.

In 1764, the councillors and the corporation of Torrelles take Ramon de Peguera to court over jurisdiction of the municipal area. The lawsuit fills a whole volume, in Spanish, Latin and Catalan.1764 It is the piece that should explain what the village was claiming, and it has not yet been read.

Ramon makes his will in Barcelona on 21 June 1767, ill in bed, and dies on 15 July, in the family's houses on the Rambla and Carrer de la Canuda.1767 The will lays down harsh conditions: it disinherited any descendant who became a cleric or did not keep the surname and coat of arms.1827 He leaves three thousand masses, fifty of them in the church of Torrelles, and charges his heir with building a shrine chamber in the church of Foix, if he himself has not been able to.1767 His widow Gertrudis administers the estate and conducts capbreu surveys in the municipal area between 1770 and 1794.1536

During the generation of Ramon-Lluís de Peguera i d'Armengol, the records show a process of family debt. On 3 November 1779 he takes out a censal loan of 3,000 pounds from the Amat family, his wife's family, and another thousand five days later. With the Peninsular War they could not pay the annuities, the Amats took them to court, and the lawsuit lasted twenty-two years, from 1826 to 1848. Ramon-Lluís made his will on 4 November 1813 and was declared incompetent in 1819.1827

The surviving accounts give an approximate picture of the estate's finances. Around 1827 it had an income of 10,724 pounds and liabilities of 7,494: leaving 3,230. That year 1,953 pounds were spent on censals, 522 on life annuities, 3,000 on rebuilding derelict buildings, 2,000 on lawsuits and 400 pounds on restoring the family archive.1827

When they had to justify why the income was worth so little, the Pegueras claimed the poor quality of the hens paid to them as rent, which they said could only fetch four pesetas each.1827 In the 19th century the municipal area was still paying its lord with hens.

The village castle was torn down around 1835.1893 Of the Pegueras' manor house only a wall remains, along with a few scattered remains in the basement.GEC

In 1874 there is a will under which the estate in the municipal area, the Roser chapel and the land known as the Navegants, passes to the village.1874 In 1881 Maria Manuela de Peguera i de Pedrolo (1821-1881), Baroness of Rocafort de Queralt, dies unmarried and without issue. The lineage dies out, and everything that remains goes to the Visitation nuns of Barcelona.GEC1742

Josep Castellanos already explained this in 1893, on returning from a stay in the village: the family died out with the last baroness, "who founded the Visitation convent, to which she left all her estate", and that "she was buried in the church-sanctuary of Foix".1893 This account agrees with other bibliographical references cited in this research.

The discrepancy can be traced through the text's transmission. The Gran Enciclopèdia Catalana shows it itself: in the entry on the Peguera lineage it says "the Visitation nuns of Barcelona", and in the entry on the municipality, for the same death and the same year, it says "Salesians".GEC

From that entry came, in 1991, a framed calligraphic plate kept by the association, signed "J. Vilalta 91". It follows the encyclopaedia's text almost word for word, including "old maid", and it carries over the "Salesians" error.1991 From the plate it passed to the Town Council's website, which has widened its circulation.

The distinction between the two communities is relevant for guiding the search for the family archive. The same plate says the castle is "documented in the 1.607", a possible misreading of 1067 that needs to be checked against the reference text.1991

The research has not been able to establish the location or extent of the community's archive. There is no collection record either in Arxius en Línia or in PARES, but this absence does not allow us to conclude that the collection is not preserved.2026 On 24 September 2026 a letter was sent to the community and to the Arxiu Diocesà de Barcelona to find out whether they hold documentation on the legacy; they have not yet replied.