The Order of the Hatchet of Tortosa — Part I

The legend of the Order of the Hatchet of Tortosa tells how the women of the city organised its defence against the threat of a Muslim attack following Ramon Berenguer IV’s conquest in 1148. In this first article, we will read the account recorded by Cristòfor Despuig and explore its historical context and the customs and privileges associated with it, notably the wearing of a garment bearing the emblem of a red battle-axe.

Over the centuries, the story grew until these honours came to be attributed to the foundation of a medieval order for women, an idea absent from Despuig’s account but still familiar today. In the second article, we will trace this transformation through the writings of the authors who transmitted the legend. A third article will examine the legend of the Portal del Romeu, or Pilgrim’s Gate, likewise associated with the defence of Tortosa and depicted in a surviving stone relief (Massip 1967; Miravall 1968).

The earliest known written account of these legends appears in Los col·loquis de la insigne ciutat de Tortosa (Dialogues of the Illustrious City of Tortosa), by Cristòfor Despuig (1510–1574), a writer and gentleman of the Catalan Renaissance. Written in 1557 and first published in 1877 in an edition prepared by Fidel Fita, the work presents a conversation between three characters who discuss historical, political, religious and social questions while defending the Catalan language and affirming the importance of Catalonia’s past. Among these reflections, Despuig also records local legends, customs and traditions (Despuig 1877 [1557], Dialogues III–IV; Solervicens 1997).

Below are the passages devoted to these legends, translated into English from my modern Catalan adaptation and preserving Despuig’s dialogue format.

The Suda Castle in Tortosa, overlooking the city and the focus of the defenders’ final resistance during the siege of 1148. Author’s photograph.

The Order of the Hatchet of Tortosa: Historical Context

As I mentioned in the first article in this series, my focus at Llegendàrium is on folklore motifs, narrative themes and oral and popular traditions rather than historiographical questions. Nevertheless, a brief historical overview will help us understand the legend we have just read.

When Ramon Berenguer IV began the conquest of Tortosa in 1148, the city was known in Arabic as Turtuixa, a small but important urban, commercial and strategic centre in al-Andalus. It had been the capital of a taifa kingdom in the eleventh century and subsequently came under Almoravid rule, which was then disintegrating. Situated on the River Ebro and well connected to the Mediterranean, it possessed a port, shipyards, markets and renowned craft workshops that naturally sustained a thriving economy. Strong walls protected the city, dominated by the imposing Suda fortress, while the main mosque, baths and suburbs supported a rich urban life, in which the Jews had their own quarter. More than simply a military outpost on the frontier, it was a prosperous town with a long mercantile and cultural tradition reaching back to Roman times, when it was known as Dertosa. Possession of the city meant control of a strategic point between the Ebro valley and the sea. Andalusi Tortosa also controlled an extensive territory encompassing the lower Ebro, the lands of the present-day districts of Baix Ebre and Montsià, and areas extending towards Ribera d’Ebre, Terra Alta, Matarranya and part of what is now northern Castelló, with its boundaries changing over the centuries (Kirchner and Virgili 2015; Negre and Suñé 2019). Muhammad al-Idrisi (1100–1165), the traveller, geographer and scholar from Ceuta, described Tortosa shortly before its conquest:

“The city of Turtuixa stands at the foot of a mountain and is protected by strong walls. It has many markets and fine buildings, artisans and farmers, and large vessels are built there from timber brought from the surrounding mountains, which are covered with pine trees of remarkable girth and height.”

Its conquest and resettlement constituted a major military undertaking with crusading status: it enjoyed the support of Pope Eugene III, who granted indulgences to participants within the wider context of the Second Crusade. This religious character helped mobilise combatants from across Europe. The siege began in early July 1148 and lasted almost six months, until the end of December (Caffaro 1890, §§ 7–9; Virgili 2001b; Villegas-Aristizábal 2009). Ramon Berenguer IV assembled his forces, including Catalan nobles such as the Grand Seneschal, Guillem Ramon de Montcada, who had a cycle of legends of his own. Other prominent knights and barons, the flower of Catalan chivalry, brought their soldiers: Pere de Sentmenat, one of the most distinguished figures in the siege, who received the castellany of one of the Suda’s three castles and other privileges, including appointment as the city’s first veguer, or royal representative; Arnau Mir of Pallars Jussà, from the Urgell region, a veteran commander who had spent his life fighting; Guillem de Copons, appointed the city’s first batlle, or bailiff, after the conquest; and Ponç de Cervera, Viscount of Bas, who had abducted Almodis, the sister of Count Ramon Berenguer III.

There were also numerous Occitan contingents, including those of Guillem VI of Montpellier, another veteran ally of the count who had taken part in campaigns such as the conquest of Almería. After a life of constant violence and a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, he became a monk shortly after the conquest of Tortosa. They were joined by the troops of Viscountess Ermengarda of Narbonne, the Count of Barcelona’s first cousin, a patron of poets and troubadours who presided over one of the most brilliant courts in southern Europe. Among the most committed participants, as warrior monks, were the knights of the orders of the Temple, the Holy Sepulchre and the Hospital. The foreign forces also included notable Anglo-Norman and Flemish contingents, who had travelled from the distant north, attracted in part by the prospect of good pay. Above all, there was a powerful fleet from the Republic of Genoa, pursuing its own political and commercial interests (Caffaro 1890, § 7; Villegas-Aristizábal 2009).

Our knowledge of the siege of Tortosa comes chiefly from the Genoese chronicle, which naturally presents events from the perspective of its Genoese protagonists. In the account of the chronicler Caffaro, the conquest reads like a film or a novel, beginning with considerable difficulties. The army established separate camps according to the origins of its contingents. The disorganisation of so diverse a force, each group with its own leaders and interests, led the Genoese to launch a premature attack without authorisation. The resulting deaths and injuries on both sides prompted the commanders of the Christian forces to prohibit further assaults without prior agreement (Caffaro 1890, § 7). The successive assaults and counterattacks were exceptionally fierce. Archaeological remains offer evidence of this violence. In Plaça de la Cinta, an accumulation of bodies without a regular burial arrangement has been interpreted as a possible emergency burial pit associated with the conquest. Human remains showing signs of violence were also found in the Suda necropolis, in layers dating to the mid-twelfth century (Kirchner and Virgili 2015, p. 120). A cemetery was also established for foreign combatants, the fossarium anglicorum, or “cemetery of the English”. A particular feature of this siege is that, like other conquests granted crusading status, it probably attracted people of every background and age who had no military experience but were religious pilgrims. A field where pilgrims had been buried was mentioned in 1149, and the cemetery appears again in documents from 1164 and 1166 (Virgili 2009; Villegas-Aristizábal 2009).

Despite these difficulties, the lower districts, suburbs and medina were occupied relatively quickly. The defenders, however, withdrew to the Suda, whose resistance prolonged the siege. Caffaro also explains that a shortage of money caused many knights to withdraw, leaving the count with only twenty of his most loyal followers (Caffaro 1890, § 9). Financial contributions from Barcelona Cathedral, its devotees and wealthy families in the County of Barcelona enabled the military campaign to continue (Virgili, “Conquesta i feudalització de les terres de l’Ebre”, n.d.). Probably the most prominent contributor was Bernat Marcús, a Barcelona burgher from a family of Greek descent, who established Europe’s first private postal service for merchants. Eventually, the besieged negotiated a period of forty days in which to obtain outside assistance, handing over hostages as a guarantee. When relief failed to arrive, they honoured the agreement and capitulated on 30 or 31 December, surrendering the Suda to the count (Caffaro 1890, § 9).

Victory set in motion the division of houses, lands and seigneurial rights. The Genoese received one-third of the city, while the remainder came under the count and his allies, particularly the powerful Montcada family. These initial arrangements changed over the following decades. In 1153, for example, the Genoese sold their third to Ramon Berenguer IV (Virgili 2001a; Caffaro 2007, introduction), with the exception of the so-called “Island of Genoa”, also known as Sant Llorenç, in the Ebro opposite Tortosa, in the area now occupied by the Ferreries district. Ownership of the island was eventually consolidated in the hands of the chapter of Genoa’s Cathedral of San Lorenzo, which encouraged settlement there, and a separate parish was established. The Bishop of Tortosa purchased it in 1289, and by the end of the Middle Ages it had joined the riverbank and ceased to be an island.

A year after the conquest, privileges and guarantees were granted to Christian settlers, who arrived gradually. Most were Catalans, but there were also Occitans, Aragonese, Italians, Flemings and people from Britain, attracted by the prospect of acquiring houses, land and new sources of income. Some of the foreign participants in the conquest settled in the city and left descendants there. The Muslims who remained were less fortunate. They became a subject population and, despite the guarantees they had received, suffered dispossession and increasing economic subordination, with residential areas outside the fortified enclosure. The Jewish community fared better, receiving its own charter of liberties in December 1149 and the former shipyard as a site on which to build homes (Virgili 2001a; Kirchner and Virgili 2015; Virgili 2009). Over the following centuries, Tortosa remained one of Catalonia’s most prosperous cities, becoming one of the five leading cities of the Principality. It retained a largely medieval urban layout while acquiring Renaissance buildings, artworks and educational institutions.

Renaissance Tortosa became an important commercial and episcopal centre with a notable cultural life. It still bore the consequences of the crises, wars and epidemics that had affected all of Catalonia during the fifteenth century, and had lost some of its earlier economic dynamism. At the same time, the sixteenth century was a good period for the city: houses and public buildings were renovated, and substantial artistic investment connected Tortosa with European Renaissance currents. The Dialogues reflect this combination of pride in Tortosa’s past and resources, satisfaction with certain improvements and criticism of its rulers’ neglect. Most relevant here is that Despuig recovered the legend of the women and the hatchet in this atmosphere of civic affirmation, which also extended to Catalonia as a whole (Solervicens 1997).

Did Despuig Invent the Legend?

Among the few documents concerning the conquest and resettlement of Tortosa, there is no reference to the Order of the Hatchet, or to the legend, until we reach the manuscript of Cristòfor Despuig, a gentleman writing centuries later (Villanueva 1806, Letter XLIII; Massip 1967). It is striking that historians such as Jeroni Pujades (1568–1635), who devotes extensive and detailed chapters to the conquest of Tortosa in the eighth volume of his Crònica Universal de Catalunya, do not give the legend so much as a line. Nor do Pere Tomic (?–1481) or Jerónimo Zurita (1512–1580), who also wrote about the conquest in Històries e conquestes dels Reys d’Aragó e Comtes de Barcelona (1438) and Anales de la Corona de Aragón (1579), respectively. This has fuelled an enduring debate over whether the legend circulated orally or was the author’s invention. Cristòfor Despuig probably received a refined humanist education, belonging as he did to one of Tortosa’s most important families. He was the son of Joan Despuig i Pinyol, the city’s chief procurator, and a descendant of one of the four knights who, according to another legend I will discuss in a future article, were the first to storm the walls of the city on the Ebro. Like his father, he played an active role in Tortosa’s municipal government (Biblioteca de Tortosa, “Pere Joan Despuig” and “La mare de Despuig”; Solervicens 1997).

Yet Despuig wrote the Dialogues as a literary work with several purposes, including the recovery and commemoration of the city’s customs and traditions. Referring to the privileges of Tortosa’s women and the associated legend, he therefore writes that “it is certainly a great misfortune that something so exceptional and important should lie so deeply buried”, or that “it has been a terrible thing to let something so remarkable disappear”.

He also says that the things he is about to relate are “difficult to believe and take a long time to tell, nor will anyone believe them unless we proceed with the records in our hands”. And he tells us that on this subject “I have read and heard”, suggesting that earlier documents may have discussed the order and that the story circulated as an oral local legend. For these reasons, we need not necessarily doubt his word, since other people in Tortosa could have accused him of lying during his lifetime. Had it been an invention, Despuig, as a member of an important family, knew that a falsehood could bring dishonour and damaging rumours upon him. If, on the other hand, it was something known in the city but increasingly forgotten, his account would have met with ready agreement.

Moreover, the gentleman includes some references to the transmission of the story that are particularly interesting from a folkloristic perspective. For example, he says he heard the elderly cathedral lecturer Baltasar Sorió explain that he had seen scapulars bearing the hatchet emblem at an archdeacon’s house. They were no longer worn at the time, “but they cannot have been abandoned for very long, since they could still be found in the ladies’ houses”. The custom would therefore have been discontinued roughly a generation earlier. He also mentions his parents, Francesca Sabertés de Despuig and the aforementioned Pere Joan Despuig, explaining that his mother had told him that “in her early years many of those garments bearing hatchet emblems could still be found in Tortosa. She said that scarcely an honourable woman was without one, although they were no longer worn then either” (Biblioteca de Tortosa, “La mare de Despuig”).

Some literary shaping is evident in the work of a man with his learned, humanist education, and he makes no attempt to conceal it. He cites the siege of Numantia, for instance, as an inspiration for the legend, at least for the episode in which the council decides to burn the city. That siege, described by classical authors whom Despuig may have known well, such as Pliny the Elder (23–79), had already acquired mythical status in Roman times. Cervantes, to name an author roughly contemporary with Despuig, wrote his play The Siege of Numantia in 1585. Despuig also takes the opportunity to assert local pride: unlike the other peoples of the peninsula, his townspeople will win the siege rather than take their own lives. In the second part, we will consider other possible classical influences, including the Amazons. The debate between men and women, and his accusation that men have misogynistic reasons for failing to remember the legend, recall other works of the Renaissance, such as Bernat Metge’s Lo somni (The Dream), which I discussed in this article, as well as humanist classics such as The Book of the City of Ladies by Christine de Pizan (1364–1430), written in opposition to the misogynistic positions of the earlier Romance of the Rose by Lorris and Meung (thirteenth century). Despuig only briefly enters a much broader debate about the condition of women, one he would surely have known through his education. This debate had been unfolding for centuries and was particularly active in the sixteenth century through the famous querelle des femmes, which had emerged in the early fifteenth century, especially through Pizan’s work (Kelly 1982). Later works would provoke controversy through their defence of women, including the pamphlet Jane Anger, Her Protection for Women (1589), Olivia Sabuco’s Nueva filosofía de la naturaleza del hombre (1587), and Il merito delle donne (1600) and La nobiltà et l’eccellenza delle donne (1600), by the Italian writers Moderata Fonte and Lucrezia Marinelli.

Despuig declares himself a defender of women, and I think we can discern his mother’s considerable influence upon him. The women’s intervention begins before they take to the walls, when they reject the men’s desperate plan to kill them and the children before going out to die in battle. It is the women who imagine an alternative and persuade the council to carry it out. Their narrative strength lies as much in their courage as in their ability to deliberate, which proves superior to that of the men. In this respect, Despuig is doing more than commemorating or reworking a legend: he is also taking an ideological and ethical position.

Alongside these clearly visible literary features, however, we can also identify structural elements and folklore motifs that appear in almost identical forms in other legends concerning medieval sieges or sieges involving women, which I will also discuss in the second part. Some of these motifs have circulated for centuries, long before Despuig. I reproduced one such story in full in the article about the young Count Guifré: the Germanic legend of the Longbeards, or Lombards, in which women disguise themselves as men and arrange their long hair to resemble beards in order to intimidate the enemy army.

The Customs Associated with the Legend

For these reasons, and for everything discussed above, I doubt that the legend was simply Despuig’s invention. Moreover, it is associated with a series of customs and traditions which, importantly, were popular rather than institutional in character, sustained by tradition. Others, such as tax exemptions and rights over clothing and jewellery, did have a legal dimension.

His distinction is revealing: “What was done, or what I have found was done, is this.” He then lists some of the customs observed in memory of the legendary feat: “When a bridegroom went to the bride’s house to take her to Mass, as is customary, the women accompanying her, who were always numerous, should walk ahead of all the men, even if royal or municipal officials were among them.” He repeats that this custom had been observed in Tortosa until quite recently. He also mentions “that women should pay no duties on their veils and other headwear. And if they outlived their husbands, all the clothing and jewellery their husbands had provided for them should remain their own property, whatever its value.” And “when the couple attended their wedding Mass, the bride should sit on the right”, meaning the place of honour or greater importance. Once again, he is candid about this last point, acknowledging that “I cannot be as certain of it as I should wish”.

For a modern reader, perhaps the most striking element is the garment some women wore, presumably on solemn occasions and at civic festivities. “To preserve the memory of that feat, the women were to wear a battle-axe emblem of crimson or scarlet cloth over a garment called a ‘passatemps’.” Despuig compares the passatemps to a Carthusian friar’s scapular: a straight, rectangular piece of cloth passing over the shoulders and hanging down the chest and back, usually at considerable length, while leaving the arms free. According to the author, it resembled a military surcoat, a garment worn over armour. The knights of Calatrava, for example, wore a scapular beneath their tunic as a symbol of their religious vow, combining a life of prayer with their military role and the defence of Christendom. Over time, large cloth scapulars diminished in size, becoming small pieces of fabric joined by ribbons or, today, small religious medals and items of jewellery, similar to amulets, which may express personal vows and devotion to saints or to images of Christ or the Virgin Mary. Other traditions have retained or modified the larger scapulars. The Carthusians’ scapular or cowl is white, like their habit, and I consider it plausible that the garment associated with the Order of the Hatchet was also white with a crimson battle-axe. Despuig, however, does not specify its background colour, so nothing definite can be said on this point (Carthusian Order, Statutes, Book III).

The origin of the name passatemps is uncertain. I can suggest four possibilities, without presenting any of them as established. The first would connect it with the word’s usual meaning of “pastime” or “amusement”: a nickname for a conspicuous garment intended for display or particular social occasions. I consider this rather unlikely. A second possibility is that passatemps was a local term for an item of clothing, or a nickname whose original meaning has been lost. A third, even less likely possibility is mentioned by Villanueva, whose account we will examine in the second part: a connection with the Latin pastinum, an agricultural implement resembling a hoe. The scholar himself dismisses it as implausible (Villanueva 1806, Letter XLIII). The possibility I find most persuasive is a symbolic interpretation connected with the passage of time. Since the garment was intended to perpetuate the memory of the feat, its name might evoke the transmission of memory between generations: the passing of time, associating it with something old, something from long ago.

Whatever the passatemps looked like, and whatever its name meant, what is particularly striking is that the garment appears to confer military honours, those of a Christian combatant, upon the women of Tortosa. In the second and final part of this article, we will see how successive versions of the legend expanded upon this detail, transforming the story within learned circles between the sixteenth and eighteenth centuries, before it returned, considerably altered, to oral transmission in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

To conclude this first part, and to return to the question raised earlier of whether Despuig invented the story, the legend can be interpreted in three ways. It may have been a popular invention, circulating orally to explain customs, privileges or laws whose original purpose had been forgotten. It may have developed alongside those customs, preserving a highly folklorised and idealised memory of some historical event unknown to us. Or the customs may have emerged after the legend, as a way of celebrating or remembering events that never happened but were believed or presented as real out of local pride. The surviving documentation makes it impossible to determine which of these explanations is the most convincing.

Whatever the case, the testimonies Despuig incorporates make it unwise to dismiss the legend as his own invention, although they do not allow us to establish how extensively he reworked earlier material in an effort to preserve its memory, however fragmentarily. The fact that we are still discussing it in the twenty-first century, and that in Tortosa the emblem is awarded to girls and young women representing the city’s associations, seems to me a good indication that the gentleman succeeded.