in the late 1330s and was made constable of Cyprus, but died in 1343. Through three of his children Hugh reestablished the Cypriot ties to the royal family of Aragon, who ruled not only Aragon but also Sardinia, Sicily, the Balearic Islands, and Athens through various branches and who shared the Lusignans' enmity with the Angevin kings of Naples and the Republic of Genoa. In 1337 a dispensation was obtained for the marriage of Hugh daughter Eschiva to Ferdinand, a member of the Majorcan branch, and the marriage proceeded in 1340. Hugh and Ferdinand clashed so violently, however, apparently over Eschiva's dowry, that King Peter IV of Aragon and Pope Benedict XII both warned Hugh of Aragonese reprisals should Ferdinand be harmed. Benedict simultaneously directed Ferdinand to be more temperate and deferential to his father-in-law. Ferdinand recorded Hugh's slights and threats to him, violence against his household members, and attacks on the Franciscans. At some point after mid-1342, claiming to have been forcibly separated from her, Ferdinand left his wife and their daughter and moved back to Europe. The second Aragonese match was secured in 1343, when Hugh's 12-year-old son John married Constance of Sicily, the 40-year-old widow of both Hugh's uncle Henry II and King Leo V of Armenia. Hugh may have hoped to salvage his relationship with the Aragonese as well as to save money by providing an income for John out of Constance's Cypriot and Armenian dowers. Constance died within a few years. The first marriage of Hugh's son Peter was likely also arranged with frugality in mind. By the time this wealthy and significantly older wife, Eschiva of Montfort, died, Peter was regarded as the heir apparent to the throne and his marriage could be used to further Hugh's interests in foreign affairs. Thus was concluded the third and most significant Aragonese union, Peter's marriage to Eleanor, daughter of Count Peter of Ribagorza, in 1353. Yet Hugh's dynastic matches, however valuable they were to him, proved that he was not equal to the kings of France and Aragon, for his children could not marry into the kings' immediate families. Personality Hugh's reign is poorly recorded in historical sources and so he remains a little-known figure. Visitors to his island kingdom thought him pious and just, but his son-in-law portrayed him as a vicious tyrant. This appears to be corroborated by the king's actions in 1349 when