El regne perdut. Quatre historiadors a la recerca de la identitat valenciana

2005, 162 pp.

The Medieval evocation —which had in its founding moment the formation of the Valencian Kingdom— has been one of the most significant referents when the contemporary Valencian identity was being built. Based on the work of four emblematic historians such as Teodor Llorente, Josep Sanchis Sivera and Joan Beneyto, a wide panoramic view of the interpretations of the medieval past —from the culminating moment of the Renaixença until the eve of the Civil War— can be offered.  It is about the views of clearly conservative authors — which more or less have a consistent “Valencianism”— who cover a broad chronological and ideological spectrum ranging from the liberalism of the Restoration to the time of the crisis of democracy, all of this happening at the more convulsive moments of the Second Republic. Seen from our perspective, the Kingdom —that is, the Valencian identity— recreated by these historians has a recognizable but strange image, because the outline of the narration given in the past differs from the view given by the current historians. To think about how those ancient scholars imagined the founding past of the country — and to understand why they did it in that way— can contribute to explain the lights and shadows of our present.