Revolt of the Barretinas
Discontent had boiled over into revolts several times, most notably in the Reapers' War (Catalan: Guerra dels Segadors) from 1640–1652.
Since many leaders of the region had committed high treason which, by the standards of the era, could easily have led to their execution en masse, this leniency was appreciated.
[1] King Charles II came to the throne in the 1660s; while generally regarded by historians as an incompetent and ineffectual ruler, his lack of activity was considered a blessing in Catalonia.
John of Austria the Younger (Don Juan José) was a popular viceroy who put important Aragonese and Catalan nobles in positions of power, earning the goodwill of the nobility.
Feliu de la Peña, an important Catalan noble, called Charles II "the best king Spain ever had.
However, government forts and barracks were in a state of ill-repair and unequipped to shelter thirty companies of horsemen, approximately 2,400 soldiers total.
After a meeting, many towns decided to accept the continued quartering of troops, but refuse to pay the military contribution to fund them.
Officials cannot leave the city in safety to draw up prosecutions or to receive testimony about crimes, nor even to arrest wrongdoers; and though we pass sentences, they cannot be carried out.
Soldiers cannot cross the province in safety...[7]The upper classes remained alarmed at the spontaneous outburst, and the administration was concerned that Barcelona could fall at a moment's notice.
800 segadors ("reapers;" the term rebel farmers adopted) marched on Puigcerdà and ordered that no one should work unless they received a minimum wage of 4 reales, inspiring similar incidents in other towns as the idea spread.
The rioters relaxed the next day, the feast of Corpus Christi; this gave soldiers the opportunity to sneak into the armory and defeat the budding revolt.
Most uprisings were small in scale and targeted against upper class Catalans exempt from the military contribution, or against unpopular citizens who no longer had the protection of a working government such as bankers, tax collectors, and moneylenders.
The European political situation had continued to worsen, and war with France now seemed inevitable as the French attacked Spain's German allies.
The Viceroy decided to try a "voluntary donation" (donativo voluntario) to reconstruct defenses and bolster the soldiers in March 1689.
The donativo gave the French a powerful tool to encourage the protest against the quartering of soldiers and taxes to become a genuine rebellion.
These proved useful contacts; one noble, Sieur Gabriel Gervais, was related to rebel Joseph Rocafort and helped pass money and supplies to him across the mountains.
Ramón de Trobat, intendant of Roussillon, wrote polemics and began to swear rebel leaders to the loyalty of France, notably Rocafort and Enric Torras.
[13] Historian Henry Kamen believes that if the French had invaded in April 1689, with the donativo still fresh in the Catalans' memory, they could have "effortlessly" captured all of Catalonia.
Possible reasons include that the commanders in Paris simply didn't realize how well their agents had succeeded, that they were more worried about the German theater of the war, or that they thought the rebels would win without need for an expensive supporting invasion.
A large peasant militia calling itself the "Army of the Land" and numbering approximately 8,000 marched on Barcelona again, as they had a year earlier.
On November 30, 1689, the peasant militia besieging Barcelona, weary of constant raids, disbanded and melted back into the countryside.
Anton Soler, a wealthy country gentleman who had been a leader of the rebels, was murdered by his own adopted son[17] for the monetary reward the government offered.
[18] Sporadic incidents continued in 1690 and 1691, but the rebellion never again regained its strength after Soler's death and the breaking of the siege of Barcelona.
[19] The swift and bloody reprisals combined with the offer of a general pardon from the viceroy for those who laid down their arms proved an effective measure to pacify the population.
[21] Under French direction in 1694, there was an attempted insurrection in Sant Feliu de Llobregat and the fort of Corbera; later, in August, there was a riot in Tarragona led by a group called "The Poor."
"[24] In 1702, the cortes voted to recognize Leopold as king, and full-scale rebellion against Philip began in 1705 with the arrival of supporting Austrian troops.
The war would continue for nine more years, until the Siege of Barcelona in 1714 when the last remaining Catalan supporters of Leopold were defeated by the combined Franco-Castilian army.
