Bellver Castle - History

History

The castle originally served as a residence for the Kings of Mallorca whenever they were not staying at mainland Europe, and was seldom used as a residence again for viceroys during the 17th century. As a fortification, it suffered and successfully resisted two sieges during the Middle Ages, the first of them in 1343, during Peter IV of Aragon's campaign to reincorporate the Majorcan territories to the Crown of Aragon, and then again in 1391 during an anti-semitic peasant revolt. The castle has only fallen once into enemy hands in its history, in 1521 after an assault during the Majorcan seconds Revolt of the Brotherhoods.

The castle was usually governed by a Lord Warden. In 1408, King Martin I of Aragon gave the lordship of Bellver to the Charterhouse of Jesus of Nazareth in Valldemossa. Charles of Viana arrived in 1459 to take possession of both the island and the castle, as he had agreed with his father King John II of Aragon, even though finally the king granted not the lordship nor the Bellver Castle.

Being an enclosed site, since the end of the 14th century it was used as a prison, firstly to lock queen Violant of Mallorca, her children James and Isabella and other supporters of King James III of Mallorca after his death in the Battle of Llucmajor in 1349. During the War of Spanish Succession it was used to imprison first supporters of Phillippe d'Anjou, and after the Bourbon victory, Maulets (supporters of the Habsburg pretender). During the Spanish Independence War it was used to hold several prisoners captured at the battle of Bailén and later, political prisoners, the most famous of these being the minister Gaspar Melchor de Jovellanos (1802–1808) who first made a description of the castle and commissioned the first blueprints and drawings of it. The prison served from then on as a political prison, used to lock up several important supporters of the subsequent Habsburg pretendants to the Spanish Throne during the 19th century, and later notable republican and Catalanist leaders during the 20th century, including Alexandre Jaume, Member of the Parliament who first won the castle for the city, and Emili Darder, who was the mayor of the city, both fusilated later.