RELATIONS between the Jewish communities of the Crown of Aragon were affected by various external and internal factors. A major internal factor was the attempt by the larger communities to influence, control, or dominate the affairs of the smaller. The dependence of the latter on main Jewish centres for some of their needs both facilitated such attempts and was used to justify them. An important external factor was the need to create a united front in conducting negotiations, and to establish appropriate channels for the Jews’ contacts, with the outside world, particularly the Crown.

JEWISH CENTRAL INSTITUTIONS

In the Crown of Aragon there was no permanent inter-communal institution representing all the Jewish communities. Representatives of the Jews of Catalonia, Aragon, and Valencia, the main constituent territories of the Crown, met when the necessity arose to discuss topics of common interest-usually relating to royal demands for new taxes and subsidies. Under Jaime I only one meeting of Jewish delegates from different territories took place, in September 1271 in Saragossa, and in this case the initiative was taken by the king. Delegates of all Aragonese and Valencian aljamas and those of Tortosa were convened to discuss the king's financial demands. There was no permanent arrangement for such meetings and, significantly, no delegates of the major Catalan aljamas attended the meeting. In fact, under Jaime I the Jews of each of the territories of his expanding realm were treated separately.

It was under Pedro III that a Jewish policy affecting all the Jews of the Crown was adopted. This was a significant development. The uniform treatment of the Jews by Pedro III was consonant with his general policy of centralization and his privileging of the interests of the Crown as a whole over those of the individual territories. It was equally compatible with his policy of using the Jews extensively in his central administration. In July 1280, in an important charter granted to the Jews of Catalonia, Pedro III authorized the aljamas to appoint delegates who could meet and take decisions for all the Jews of his dominions. Nevertheless, there is no evidence that such a general meeting of the Jewish representatives of the aljamas of the Crown ever took place during his reign.