Catalans revolt against the Spanish crown
7 JUNE 1640
On Corpus Christi day in 1640, popular unrest in Barcelona ignited into a full-scale uprising. Riots erupted across the city, spearheaded by segadors– ‘reapers’ – who used sickles as weapons.
Amid the chaos, the Viceroy of Catalonia, Dalmau de Queralt, was lynched by the insurgents. They seized control of strategic points, including the city gates, and declared support for the region’s independence from Spain. This marked the beginning of the Catalan Revolt, also known as the Reapers’ War, which would last until 1659.
Much of Europe throughout the early 17th century was embroiled in the Thirty Years’ War, which was essentially a clash of religious, political and territorial tensions between Catholic and Protestant states, exacerbated by dynastic ambitions and power struggles. There were also localised pockets of violence, and one offshoot was the expansive war that broke out between France and Spain in May 1635. Situated geographically between the two, Catalonia was caught at its centre.
Unrest had long been stirring. In the 1620s, King Philip IV of Spain’s favourite, the Count-Duke of Olivares, had initiated the ‘Union of Arms’, which aimed to mobilise funds and a reserve army of tens of thousands from across Philip’s empire – from the Spanish Netherlands to the Kingdom of Sicily. The Catalans, increasingly wary of Castile’s (central
