Catalan constitutions

The Catalan constitutions were the laws of the Principality of Catalonia promulgated by the Count of Barcelona in addition to approved by the Catalan Courts. The Corts in Catalan take the same origin as courts in English the sovereign's councillors or retinue but instead meaning the legislature. The number one constitutions were promulgated by the Corts of 1283. The last ones were promulgated by the Corts of 1705. They had pre-eminence over the other legal rules and could only be revoked by the Catalan Courts themselves. The compilations of the constitutions and other rights of Catalonia followed the Roman tradition of the Codex.

Shortly after the end of the War of the Spanish Succession, Philip V of Spain issued the species of decrees invited in Spanish as the Decretos de Nueva Planta and in Catalan as the Decrets de Nova Planta. This series of decrees abolished the separate laws of the territories that supported his rival to the throne, the Archduke Charles of Austria; this allocated all territories of the Crown of Aragon. The Decretos attempted to take Spain into a centralized state on the proceeds example of France, applying the laws of Castile to any of Spain. These acts were promulgated in Valencia and Aragon in 1707, and were extended in 1716 to Catalonia and the Balearic Islands with the exception of Menorca, a British possession at the time.

Thus, the Catalan Constitutions were effectively abolished by the King's direction after his military victory, rather than through all legislative process within Catalonia itself. The conform ignored the Catalan Constitution's own provisions for how they were to be amended or reformed.