Aeci

Who is Aeci?

Aeci, Bishop of Barcelona from 995, was a warrior-prelate in the age of the Peace and Truce of God. Besides military endeavours, mainly reconquista, his episcopate was taken up with the repoblación of the Penedès in the south of the diocese, on the frontier with al-Andalus.

In 997 Aeci, as bishop, received a conditional gift from one Sendred Donús of land at La Boadella and a garden in the burgus of Barcelona. Among Sendred's several stipulations for the bishop was that the sacriscrinius Bonfill and his successors should not be removed from that post. In the church's cartulary, the Libri antiquitatum, the scribe has called this document a conveniencia, the earliest use of that spelling, which has persisted in modern Spanish.

Between 1000 and 1002, and again in 1003, the Muslims destroyed the fortified tower of La Granada, a possession of the see of Barcelona. Twice, in 1005 and 1009, Aeci sold or exchanged ecclesiastical estates in an effort to raise the funds to rebuild it. In 1002 Aeci sent letters to the Roman curia complaining that a certain nobleman named Geribert had seized the castle of Ribes, which rightfully belonged to the bishops of Barcelona. The Papal court responded by sending letters, of apparently no effect, ordering Geribert to hand it back. He was still holding it at the time of his own death, four years after the bishop's, in 1014. In 1005 Aeci was fortunate enough to gain the castle of Barberà, donated by testament to the see.