ABSTRACT
The majority of the kings of Navarre during the fourteenth century expressly safeguarded the rights of the Hospital of St John. In the twelfth and thirteenth centuries the kings of Navarre made a few donations of royal property to the Hospital, but none at all in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. The price paid by the Navarrese Hospitallers for their proximity to royal power was increasing intervention by the Crown in the priory's internal affairs throughout the fifteenth century. Yet the monarchy's policy of protecting the Hospitallers was limited: the kings fiercely reserved the exercise of final jurisdiction within the Order's dominions for themselves. However possible indication of special royal backing is the fact that in the fourteenth century the monarch awarded some tax concessions that would have benefitted the Hospitallers. Among the monarchical actions with the greatest repercussions on the Hospitallers were the decisions given in legal disputes affecting the order.
