Miramar

One of Llull’s proposals was to set up missionary schools, and he devoted himself to this task almost straight away, begging the young James of Majorca to found a school of this sort. They found some land at Miramar, facing the sea and positioned atop dramatic cliffs on the magnificent north coast of Majorca, between Deià and Valldemosa, and on the 17th of October, 1276, the project received confirmation in the form of a bull by Pope John XXI (Peter of Spain, author of the Summulae logicales) such that ‘thirteen Franciscan friars be sent there to learn Arabic for the purpose of converting unbelievers’.

Source: Anthony Bonner and Lola Badia, Ramon Llull. Vida, pensament i obra literària (Barcelona: Empúries, 1988), pp. 22.

The Vita coetanea states that it was Llull who convinced King James II of Majorca to found the Franciscan monastery of Miramar. A Papal document, although it does not mention Llull, confirms the foundation of the monastery on the part of James II in 1276 and specifies its purpose: the education of monks in Arabic so that they might act as missionaries in Islamic lands. We know from later documents of Alphonso III and James II of Aragon that these foreign kings, after having taken possession of Majorca in 1285, continued to protect Miramar - although no reference is made to the missionary purpose emphasised both by James II and by Llull. In his Desconhort (1295), Llull lamented the demise of Miramar; a circumstance confirmed by a document from 1301, which stated that the monastery no longer existed.

Source: J.N. Hillgarth, Diplomatari lul·lià: documents relatius a Ramon Llull i a la seva familia, trans. L. Cifuentes (Barcelona: Edicions de la Universitat de Barcelona, 2001), p. 12.