Yes, sure, but my point was "Occitania" is a latin word. I do not recall any other french word apart from "Languedoc".
The Barcelona chancery (as the poor excuse for a chancery used by the Toulouse) used latin exclusively until the 13th c.
As all continental chanceries : the point is not that it set a standard for the language, rather that it set an institution with formal standards that are then "vulgarized", either to more popular customs, or to later chanceries.
The White confraternity affair was years before the Crusade, relating to usury.
It was structured in 1210 and not years before the Crusade, and was charged to "track down heretics and usurers", as usury was often associated with heterodoxy and heresy by Folquet of Marseilles, bishop of the city. It's most definitely a product of the political and religious infighting within Toulouse (with the "Black Confraternity"), and certainly a point on which the authorities of the city and the Younger Count (for people interested, Raimondins had a tradition of dual rulership, with both the Count and his son were counts, the son usually acting as a junior ruler).
Part of the WHite Confraternity leaved Toulouse with Folquet when Toulouse became a target of Crusade (far from all, of course, and the city was almost in the misdt of a civil war until 1211) and banded together with Crusaders, notably with the Siege of Lavaur. As the case of Baudouin de Toulouse highlights, both Counts had to stress their authority on the native population, of "their language" (among population of a cosmopolite city, and among a band of Crusaders which were far from sharing his own).
The declaration of Raymond VII is not aimed at Toulousains, as they were probably dealt with before, as the extensive sales in 1218 tend to show, but to others. This is one of the very few political acts in which the count claims authority on any Occitan speaker ; a more usual way would have been to use a feudal or political term ("fideles nostri", "vassali nostri", "homines de terra nostra"...)
It was aimed at the consuls of Toulouse (IRRC) that were the main authorities of the city even before the Counts, in a context of regional war (with understones of civil war).
Now, I admit I misread 1220 for 1210, which lead to the previous mistake.
That said, the point still helds IMO : the distinction between two languages is something you find in other sources, and probably as a by-product of the Crusade which brang the opposition between Occitan-speaking persons (parts of it joining with Crusaders) and Crusaders reputed to speak French (which is false, of course, even disregarding the first point : you had Auvergnats, French, German troops).
On this regard, the Count is not claiming any authority on every Occitan-speaker, but validate for the Consuls and the city of Toulouse at large the right to act against who joined the fight against the Count, but only those "of our language, meaning our own speech". There was cleaning the mess and gathering supporters, and there was stricking back senslessly in a period where Raimond tries to negociate with Crusaders and the king. Raimond simply can't afford part of the city to act against him, not after Louis of France's campaign the year before.
While the distinction between two parts of the realm, one Occitan the other French speaking, is not entierly due to Capetian influence (altough they took a large, very large part in it), it was fairly recent and not tracable earlier than the 1210's in texts. IIRC, the first mention is by the archbishop of Narbonne that say that the people of "Gallic speech" entered the city without his authorisation and in arms.
Estates provincials were called Estates Generals, to distinguished them from the Particular Estates, such as Velay or Albigeois.
I English, Estates Generals tends to name more properly the Etats Généraux. As for Etats Provinciaux, they were generally called as Etats from [insert Province]. Namely,
Etats du Languedoc, in our case, or admittedly, Etats Généraux of [insert Province]
Even if they were not efficient vis-a-vis the royal centralization
It's not as much they weren't efficient : it's that they were created by the royal power in a perspective of unification and systematisation of the territory. Asking from these regional assemblies of the nobility and upper classes to clash, even slightly, with the main purposes of the royal power would have been too much honestly : the Estates of Languedoc survived mostly because they had the political sense to ally with miscontents outside the province, and because Richelieu didn't want to press the matter too much even in victory.
[QUOTEand especially they cultivated the cultural distinction of the province. Need I remind you of the Histoire générale de Languedoc ?[/QUOTE]
Which have little to do with the efficience, power or autonomy of the Estates, tough. The book was about presenting the province in the best of lights, and Dom Vaisette mixed his own scholar interest with the will of depicting it as a vibrant part of the whole kingdom (see his other works), not about arguing for the autonomy or particularism.
Written Law is not a reference to the Customs, but to the fact the judges used Roman Law ("the" written law) even in front of a custom.
Theodosian Law and Alaric Law weren't as much written down in legal process, than largely knew and providing a standard of validation. Even there, the codification played a relatively secondary role before the commentaries, jurisprudence, etc. Still, it's what existed for the main part of judicial process in southern France.
The influence of Roman law strictly speaking was relatively recent there, with a strong Italian influence. This met, from the 1160's/1170's, a dynamism of urban freedoms born out of the geopolitical mess of the region. What was essentially at first a judicial ensemble tailored for merchants and trade representative, met with a common right based on Roman law itself.
But that did not prevent local judges to know and to use Roman Law.
It didn't prevented people in Northrn France to use it either : but the difference is that it didn't mixed-up with urban freedoms and judicial corpus, "popularizing" it in common affairs.
It took time, however, way beyond the rest of the County's lifespawn, mostly because it wasn't widely accepted : Peire Cardinal consider it to be nothing but cheating and pedantism, for instance, and you'd have to wait decades to find ONE legist as part of the Count's council.
As for the Custom of Toulouse, Montfort has nothing to do with it.
Mea culpa, I meant Alphonse de Poitiers (that's what I get for posting at work).
See, before the creation of the University of Toulouse from one part, and the political support of the legists, Roman Law was often ill-considered and not institutionalized.It's really the Capetian presence that gave it a boost as the regular judicial basis of the region : before the XIVth century, the distinction between Pays de Droit Ecrit, and Pays de Droit Commun is mostly senseless.
May I advise you Henry Gilles on this? The work is a bit old, but tourough.
I mostly agree with you, but let us not forget a more simpler evolution : personal union. The Barcelona could go for a Toulouse heiress, as they did in Provence. Given the small size of the Toulouse countal house, it would be a simple way to unite both principalities.
I remain largely unconvinced there.
The small size of the Raimondins is debatable for anything befoe the XIIth century : Dom Vaisette simply let too many gaps and blanks in his works (remember that he left out three counts out of his comput). True, the lack of archives maintained or correctly put together didn't help him, but at least we don't know enough about the spawn of the Raimondine house to affirm it was reduced. Heck, several cadet branches did survived its extinction.
Which bring the other point : a good part of the support for Raimondines was both dynastical but as well political (see how Toulouse fought back Guilhèm's claims on Tolsan) and the men of Raimondins weren't really ready to follow a Barcelonese duke they would have fought mere years before, IMO : Barcelone and Toulouse seems like a good depiction of hereditary foes and their conflcit led to a local and fierce Hundred Years War (that and the conflicts earlier, arguably lasting nearly one century as well). I doubt such succession would be smooth, to say the least, even taking in account that a matrimonial policy directed at Barcelona doesn't make this much sense for Toulouse (you could argue, I concede it, that it could be part of a peace settlement contract)