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Ownership of mines and taxation in Castilian laws, from the middle ages to the early modern period: the decisive influence of the sovereign in the history of mining

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 April 2011

JEANNETTE GRAULAU
JEANNETTE GRAULAU
Affiliation:
The City University of New York, Herbert H. Lehman College, Department of Political Science.
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Abstract

Sovereign ownership of mines and taxation were fundamental principles governing the mining economy of the territories of the Castilian crown during the medieval period. Ownership of mines meant that mineral wealth, discovered or undiscovered, belonged to the crown estate. Only the sovereign could grant mining rights to ‘private’ persons and impose mineral taxation. Particularly during the last three centuries of the Reconquista (thirteenth to fifteenth centuries), these principles were used to unify the situation in those territories falling under the sway of a sovereign with expansionist ambitions. Increasing globalisation of the metal trade in the thirteenth century and the formation of capital markets in Europe firmly put the Castilian crown in competition with other economic agents aiming to win a monopoly in metallic wealth. Castile's mining laws aspired to solve the ensuing tension by attracting merchant capital to the mines, aiming to absorb the comparative advantages of mining capital. In a protracted process, the mineral laws of the sixteenth century were a testimony to the decisive influence of the sovereign in the history of mining.

Mines et taxes selon la législation castillane en vigueur du moyen age à l'époque moderne: l'influence décisive de la propriété royale pour l'histoire minière

Sur les terres du roi de Castille, au Moyen Age, les mines appartenaient à la Couronne, autant que les impôts levés. Ces principes régissaient toute l'économie minière. Posséder les mines signifiait que l'Etat royal avait la richesse minière, quelle soit connue ou encore non découverte. Seul le souverain avait le pouvoir d'attribuer un privilège d'exploitation à des personnes „privées“ puis d'exiger le paiement d'impôts sur l'activité minière. Pendant les trois derniers siècles de la Reconquête (XIIIe-XVe siècles) ces principes servirent d'arguments unificateurs pour justifier la domination d'un souverain à l'expansionnisme ambitieux sur les territoires alors concernés. La globalisation croissante du commerce métallique au cours du XIIIe siècle, alliée, en Europe, à la formation de marchés capitalistes, plaça la Couronne de Castille en compétition avec des agents économiques susceptibles de prendre le monopole de richesses minières. Aboutissement d'un très long processus, la législation minière du XVIe siècle témoigne de l'influence décisive du souverain sur l'histoire minière.

Bergwerksbesitz und besteuerung im kastilischen recht im mittelalter und zu beginn der frühen neuzeit: der entscheidende einfluss der krone in der bergwerksgeschichte

Der Bergbau in den Territorien der kastilischen Krone wurde im Mittelalter durch die grundlegenden Prinzipien der königlichen Vorrechte (Regalien) auf Bergbaubesitz und Besteuerung bestimmt. Nach dem Bergregal gehörten alle Erzvorkommen, ob bereits entdeckt oder nicht, zum Krongut. Nur der König konnte Schürf- und Abbaurechte an „Privatpersonen“ verleihen oder Steuern auf Erze und Mineralien erheben. Besonders in den drei letzten Jahrhunderten der Reconquista (13. bis 15. Jahrhundert) wurden diese Prinzipien dazu benutzt, um in den Territorien, die nun in den Einflussbereich eines expansionistisch ambitionierten Herrscherhauses gerieten, die innere Einheit voranzutreiben. Die zunehmende Globalisierung des Metallhandels im 13. Jahrhundert und die Herausbildung eines europäischen Kapitalmarktes brachten die kastilische Krone in scharfe Konkurrenz zu anderen Akteuren, die auf ein Monopol der Metallvorkommen aus waren. Die kastilischen Bergbaugesetze zielten darauf ab, die daraus erwachsenden Spannungen dadurch zu lösen, dass man Handelskapital in den Bergbau lockte, um so die komparativen Vorteile des Bergbaukapitals einzustreichen. Den Endpunkt dieses langwierigen Prozesses bildeten die Bergbaugesetze des 16. Jahrhunderts, die den entscheidenden Einfluss der Krone auf die Bergbaugeschichte bezeugen.

Type
Research Article
Information
Continuity and Change , Volume 26 , Issue 1 , May 2011 , pp. 13 - 44
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

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References

ENDNOTES

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54 The law established that if the mines yielded more than 1½ mark per quintal of lead-silver, but less than 4 marks, the payment owed to the crown was one-fifth part of the silver, without deducting expenses. If the mines yielded more than 4 marks per quintal of lead-silver but less than 6 marks, one-quarter part of the silver had to be paid, without deduction of expenses. For the mines that yielded more than 6 marks per quintal of lead-silver, regardless of quality, half of the silver extracted had to be paid, without deduction of expenses. For gold mines, the 1584 ordinances established that half of the gold extracted had to be paid, without deduction of expenses. Halleck, A collection of mining laws, 71–2. Other taxes were imposed for the silver extracted from the terreros (rubbish) and slag of abandoned mines.

55 The one-tenth applied for a period of 10 years from 22 December 1611. Immediately, a controversy started in Peru and La Plata. The guild of miners claimed that the new tax overruled the one-fifth tax. Miners claimed that the policy of the one-tenth tax had to apply to all mines in operation prior to 22 December 1611. Hanke and Rodríguez, Los virreyes españoles, México; Martínez Martínez, ‘Historia del Derecho en América Hispana’; Sandoval y Guzmán, Pretensiones. Among the most influential groups of miners in Spanish America was the guild of azogueros (mercury producers) of Peru. Legally, they were entitled to a special protection by the crown. In 1572, Philip II established a law favouring miners and azogueros with ‘all the privileges (preeminencias) granted by the Kings, our ancestors, and by us, as having in every respect the force of law; and especially that, for no debts of whatsoever nature they may be, if not due to us, may or shall any execution be issued against the slaves and negroes, the tools, provisions, and other things necessary for the supply, working and provision of the Mines, and the persons who work in them’. Halleck, A collection of mining laws, 141.

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71 Halleck, A collection of mining laws, 99.

72 Halleck, A collection of mining laws, 40. Mining, however, naturally resisted accounting requirements. The first pressing problem of accounting was how to account for extracted ores (versus refined ores), particularly in mines where ‘ore recyclers’ slowly penetrated and invaded the sites of processed and discarded ores. This problem haunted the sovereign crown and its inspectors in the mines of Almadén and Idria. The second pressing problem was one of bureaucratic order: how to deal with the book accounts written in a foreign language by foreign merchants when the accounts were handed over for royal inspection? This was the case of Mateo Alemán, inspecting the book accounts of the Fugger for the mines of Almadén. G. Bleiberg, El «Informe Secreto» de Mateo Alemán sobre el trabajo forzoso en las minas de Almadén (London, 1985); Lang, El monopolio; Matilla Tascón, Las minas de Almadén; H. Valentinitsch, ‘Die Versorgung des Bergwerks Idrija (Idria) mit Gefäßen für die Quecksilbergewinnung 1490–1750’, in E. Westermann, ed., Bergbaureviere als Verbrauchszentren im vorindustriellen Europa (Stuttgart, 1977), 21–32.

73 Álvarez Nogal, Los banqueros de Felipe IV.

74 Flynn and Giráldez propose that demand for silver of the Ming dynasty and its stimulus for global trade during the period 1550–1650 absorbed most of the American silver. D. O. Flynn, ‘Comparing the Tokugawa Shogunate with Hapsburg Spain: two silver-based empires in a global setting’, in James D. Tracy ed., The political economy of merchant empires (Cambridge, 1991), 332–59; D. Flynn, O. and Giráldez, A., ‘Born with a “silver spoon”: the origin of world trade in 1571’, Journal of World History 6, 2 (1995), 201–21Google Scholar; D. Flynn, O. and Giráldez, A., ‘China and the Spanish Empire’, Revista de Historia Económica 14, 2 (1996), 309–38CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

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77 A good example is the regulation established by the government of Montesclaros in Peru for the transport and deliveries of silver from Arica, Potosí and Oruro to Callao. From this port in Peru, silver travelled to the port of Tierra Firme in Panamá, en route to Seville through the Bahamas channel. Ships had to be in Havana before the end of the summer to avoid the hurricane season. This timetable imposed by nature required tremendous mobilisation of local and regional transportation corridors, enforced by the law. A royal letter (cédula) dated 30 December 1607 imposed the calendar for deliveries of silver. The central nervous system, as Latasa Vassallo puts it, of this transportation timetable was similar to that for the deliveries of mercury from Huancavelica, to the mining towns of Peru. I. González Tascón, D. Romero Muñoz and A. Sáenz Sanz, ‘Los caminos del mercurio de Almadén a Nueva España’, in Actas del II Congreso internacional de caminería hispánica, tomo III (Madrid, 1994), 683–92; P. Latasa Vassallo, ‘El transporte de plata en el Atlántico: conflicto entre los intereses peruanos y metropolitanos’, in J. A. Armillas Vicente ed., VII Congreso internacional de historia de América, la economía marítima de la pesca, navegación y comercio, vol. III (Aragón, 1996), 1567–81.

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94 Carande, Carlos V; Kellebenz, Los Fugger en España y Portugal.

95 Carande, Carlos V; Ehrenberg, Capital & finance; Kamen, Philip of Spain; Kellenbenz, Los Fugger en España y Portugal. A useful spatial analysis of relations of trade and credit cities is R. Pieper, ‘Espacios y relaciones económicas en el Imperio de Carlos V’, in A. Otazu ed., Dinero y crédito (Siglos XVI al XIX), Actas del Primer Coloquio internacional de historia económica (Madrid-Villalba-Segovia, 1977), 549–60.

96 Ehrenberg, Capital & finance.

97 Cited in Carande, Carlos V, vol. I, 223.

98 Carande, Carlos V.

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