Early Modern Social Networks: The Vallgornera Family across the Mediterranean Sea

The primary objective for my submission will be the investigation of the Vallgornera family, a Catalan family that successfully produced three cadet families in Sicily.  I will endeavor to explicate the relationship between the original Catalan Vallgornera family and its cadet families in Sicily to elucidate the socio-political framework of the Mediterranean from the late fifteenth to the early seventeenth centuries.  My nascent research of the family indicates that the Catalan founders at least maintained their noble status throughout the period in question.  The Sicilian cadet families, on the other hand, clearly rose in their ranks, first acquiring the titles of counts in the sixteenth century and princes in the seventeenth century.  What strategies did each family employ to sustain or elevate themselves in their respective socio-political climates?  How did the Sicilian cadet families relate to the original founding family in Catalonia?  What continuities and commonalities distinguish them as a Mediterranean family?