The Castilla of Catalonia

The territory of La Nogera, a large region located between the central Catalan depression and the pre-Pyrenees of Lleida, was during the High Middle Age, at the end of the Muslim dominion, an expansive zone of the important County of Urgell, with the city of Balaguer as capital. 

The feudal castles constituted the nuclei of the territories that were under the power of the nobility. During the Middle Age, the society was tremendously hierarchical. The noblemen and some knights lived in the castles, with the "garrison" as protection army, and of course the household servants at the service of the lord who were always paying attention to his orders and necessities. 

In the surroundings of the fortress there were two kinds of lands: the ones that belonged to the noblemen and the parcels granted to the people by the noblemen to be worked, and always controlled by a delegate of the feudal lord, with the obligation to pay their condition as vassals with a big part of the harvest.

The thing was that, a big part of wealth of the noblemen came, besides the wars, inheritances and convenient marriages, from the cultivation of their lands. The people were at the service of the feudal lord.