Page:History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic Vol. I.djvu/131

ARAGON. cxiii claims the glory too, of having compiled the most sectiox ancient written code, among the moderns, of mari time laAV now extant, digested from the usages of commercial nations, and which formed the basis of the mercantile jurisprudence of Europe during the Middle Ages.^^ The wealth which flowed in upon Barcelona, Her free m- as the result of her activity and enterprise, was evinced by her numerous public works, her docks, arsenal, ware-houses, exchange, hospitals, and other constructions of general utility. Strangers, who visited Spain in the fourteenth and fifteenth cen- turies, expatiate on the magnificence of this city, its commodious private edifices, the cleanliness of its streets and public squares (a virtue by no means usual in that day), and on the amenity of its gar- dens and cultivated environs." But the peculiar glory of Barcelona was the free- dom of her municipal institutions. Her govern- ment consisted of a senate or council of one hun- dred, and a body of regidares or counsellors, as they were styled, varying at times from four to six in number ; the former intrusted with the legislative, '4 Heeren, Essai sur I'lnflaence '5 Navagiero, Viaggio, fol. 3. — des Croisades, traduit par Villers, L. Marineo styles it " the most (Paris, 1808,) p. 376. — Capmany, beautiful city he had ever seen, or Mem. de Barcelona, torn. i. p. 213, to speak more correctly, in the also pp. 170-180. — Capmany whole world." (Cosas Memora- fixes the date of the publication of bles, fol. 18.) Alfonso V., in one the Consulado del Mar at the mid- of his ordinances, in 1438, calls it die of the thirteenth century, under " urbs venerabilis in egregiis tem- James I. He discusses and refutes plis, tuta ut in optimis, pulchra in the claims of the Pisans to prece- cseteris sedificiis," &c. Capmany, dence in this codification. See his Mem. de Barcelona, torn. ii. Preliminary Discourse to the Cos- Apend. no, 13. tumbres Maritimas de Barcelona. VOL. I.