The Viscounts of Tartas. Weight and significance of one of the regional authorities between english Gascony and the Kingdom of Navarra (11th century - 1312)

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to highlight one of the most prominent viscountcies of Gascon territories during the Middle Ages, which controlled a territory stretching from the Gascon coast to the central lands of the Landes, but it also extended its domain to a part of Basse-Navarre territories. These latter would have been of fundamental interest because they would open the door to a framework of alliances forged within the lands under the rule of the king of Navarre.

Through this article we will point out the strategies of these viscounts to increase their assets around the core of their domain of Tartas, and also the social networks that they built up all throughout the Middle Ages, which allowed them to go beyond the strict spatial scale of their domains. This will enable us to see how the Viscounts of Tartas, which originally were merely a secondary entity in the Gascon territories, gradually became prominent figures not only within the lands of the king of England, but also for the king of Navarre, who was at that time trying to assert his control over the region of Basse Navarre, relying on the local aristocracy. However, we will see that the relationship with the King of Navarre was subsidiary to the territorial strategies of the viscounts, as their interests were concentrated in the central lands of the Landes or the basin of the Garonne river, in the Bordeaux area. Their social networks, by contrast, were carefully designed considering Navarrese territories, which would enable them to establish long-term partnerships with important families such as the Viscounts of Béarn.

The wish of the viscount of Tartas to organize the territory as well as to build a strong network within the Gascon territory was truncated by the biological extinction of the main branch of the family in 1312, although their strategies settled a framework which allowed their heirs - the lords of Albret - to become one of the most powerful entities of Gascony in the Middle Ages.