ABSTRACT
In the fifteenth century two Catalans, Antoni de Fluvià (1421–37) and Pere Ramon Sacosta (1461–67), rose to become masters of the Hospital; they were the first Catalans to attain that office. In the case of Fluvià, there is scarce information about his career before he was elected to the highest rank in the Order. By contrast, we are able to trace in detail sacosta’s long career from his reception as a knight brother in about 1418 until his death in 1467 aged 64: his age is recorded on the tombstone which survives in the Vatican. 1 Sacosta was not born into an illustrious noble lineage or into a rich and influential family of Barcelona patricians. Several sacostas are documented as unimportant knights or squires in the western part of Catalonia around the small town of agramunt on the Urgel plateau, not very far from the Pyrenees and no great distance from the area where Antoni de Fluvià’s origins, also in a humble lineage of knights, are to be found. In both cases the meagre incomes from their lordships made them dependent either on the offices they could obtain from the monarchy or on a religious career.
