Roger II Trencavel

Roger II Trencavel (died March 1194) was the Viscount of Carcassonne,Béziers,Razès, and Albi from 1167 or 1171 until his death. Until 1177 he used the title proconsul, usually as proconsul de Bitteris (of Béziers), but he abandoned the usage when he became a vassal of the Crown of Aragon. His government of his lands was characterised by increasing complexity, such as the development of the offices of seneschal and sub-vicar, but his later years are characterised by financial troubles and a "general malaise" perhaps brought about by his poor relations with the Church hierarchy in light of his favourable attitude towards Catharism.

Roger was the elder of two sons of Raymond I Trencavel and Saure. As a child in 1153 he was placed in the "custody and service" of Ermengard of Narbonne. Eventually he inherited all four of Raymond's viscounties on his death in 1167. However, Raymond V of Toulouse objected to the young Roger and instead enfeoffed Roger-Bernard I of Foix with the viscounties in December 1167 at Narbonne. Roger rebelled. He retook Béziers in 1169 with the assistance of troops from Aragon and Catalonia. After taking the city, Roger brought the Aragonese inside to murder the citizens who had handed the city over to his rival. However, in November 1171, Raymond drew Roger away from Alfonso II of Aragon by enfeoffing him with the viscounties and depriving the count of Foix.

Roger married the young Adalais, daughter of Raymond of Toulouse, in 1171. It opened the only (brief) period of alliance between Roger and Raymond. Adalais' dowry was the town of Minerve, a fief of the King of France. In 1176, Roger held a public inquiry to prove his lordship of the village of Mèze. About the same time (c. 1175), Alfonso of Aragon held a public inquiry to prove that Carcassonne was his possession and that Roger II merely held it from him at his pleasure. In the late 1180s, Roger began the compilation of a cartulary to collect the charter evidence for his rule. The cartulary contained 248 folios and was written in proto-Gothic script.

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