Aggregation process
Like all the great houses of the Spanish nobility, the house of Medinaceli was formed over the centuries by the aggregation of other houses from the different peninsular kingdoms, which in turn were also the product of the concentration of territories and lineages.
In order to explain with some clarity this complex process of house merging and territorial enlargement, we have created three sections that analyse the same process from different scales of analysis: the section "....Houses added"offers a schematic perspective at an aggregation level that has many parallels with the current organic sections of the Ducal Archive of Medinaceli and that, to a large extent, helps to explain its organisation; the section ".Titles incorporatedThe section "The House of Medinaceli" allows us to distinguish the chronological itinerary followed, through houses and lineages, by each of the titles incorporated to the House of Medinaceli or to any of its aggregates and, finally, the section "The House of Medinaceli and the House of Medinaceli".Territorial Expansion"will follow the same chronological path from the basic territorial unit of the seigniory.
Houses added
In this section we explain the fundamental structure of the process of aggregation of houses to that of Medinaceli. For reasons of clarity of exposition, we have established a double restriction: we limit ourselves to the process of aggregation of some houses to others when these already form part of the titled nobility and we only consider the union of estates by marriage or inheritance.
Titles incorporated
We describe for each of the titles that have been historically linked to the House of Medinaceli, either by mercy to this House or to any of its aggregates, the context of their concession and the sequence that they trace as they pass from one lineage and house to another until they reach the said House of Medinaceli or any of its aggregates, although today they have left it.
Territorial expansion
This section is devoted to the complete analysis of the territorial expansion of each of the houses added to that of Medinaceli. Starting from the basic unit of the lordship, all the possible ways of aggrandisement, royal grants, dowries, sales and purchases, exchanges, etc. are described, with the aim of creating a sort of thesaurus that allows a better understanding of this complex process.