No CrossRef data available.
Article contents
An Historical Event and its Interpretation: The Castilian Grain Crisis of 1506-1507*
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 04 January 2016
Extract
We are all familiar with situations in which we study an historical event, think that we understand it, and then, to our surprise, discover that other historians interpret it quite differently. This happened to me recently, and I should like to describe here what happened, meaning my original understanding and then the interpretations of others who had studied it before me but whose works I had not known about, and then try to draw some conclusions from the experience.
- Type
- Research Article
- Information
- Copyright
- Copyright © Social Science History Association 1978
Footnotes
*
This paper was read at the Annual Meeting of the Iowa College and University Teachers of History, Cornell College, October 15, 1977. It combines and revises material presented in the Henry A. Russel Lecture at the University of Michigan on March 15, 1977, and at the Conference of the Society for Spanish and Portuguese Studies at the University of Kentucky on March 25, 1977.
References
Notes
1 Bernaldez, Andrés, Memorias del reinado de los Reyes Católicos, Gómez-Moreno, Manuel and de Mata Carriazo, Juan, eds. (Madrid, 1962), 18–19Google Scholar. Clemencín, Diego, “Elogio de la reina católica Doña Isabel,” Memorias de la Real Academia de la Historia, 6 (1821), 551–52Google Scholar. The Castilian fanega of this period is equal to 55.5 liters.
2 de Mata Carriazo, Juan, ed., El tumbo de los Reyes Católicos del concejo de Sevilla, 5+ vols. (Sevilla, 1929–71), 4: 156–58Google Scholar. The order was repeated in 1491 for a period of three years. See ibid., 5: 222-23. Ibarra y Rodríguez, Eduardo, El problema cerealista en España durante el reinado de los Reyes Católicos (1475-1516) (Madrid, 1944), 138-39, 159Google Scholar, App. 1. Cf. Jaime Vicens Vives, with the collaboration of Jorge Nadal Oiler, An Economic History of Spain, Frances M. López-Morillas, trans. (Princeton, New Jersey, 1969), 30. Further study of the crisis of 1486-87 may modify our remarks.
3 Libro de las bulas y pragmáticas de los Reyes Católicos, 2 vols. (Madrid, 1973; facsimile of edition of 1503), 2: 314r. Ibarra y Rodríguez, op. cit., 78, 82-83, 83-84, 86, 98-99, 136. Bernaldez, op. cit., 515. Lucio Marineo Siculo spoke of the difficulty of finding food in Medina del Campo in 1503. See Lynn, Caro, A College Professor of the Renaissance; Lucio Marineo Siculo among the Spanish Humanists (Chicago, 1937), 137–38Google Scholar. Diego Ortiz de Zúñiga, Anales eclesiásticos y seculares de la muy noble ciudad de Sevilla, 5 vols., (Madrid, 1795-96), 3: 191. The Royal Council commented on shortages of pan (meaning bread, flour, or grain) in Toledo in the summer of 1504. See Rodrigo Almada Rodríguez et al., eds., Documentos de asunto económico correspondientes al reinado de los Reyes Católicos (1475-1516), fase. 1 (Madrid, 1917) (Publicaciones de la Academia universitaria católica, 1), 41. A letter of King Ferdinand in October, 1504, speaks of the “neçessidad de pan.” See “Correspondencia de los Reyes Católicos con el Gran Capitan durante las campañas de Italia,” Revista de archivos, bibliotecas y museos, 3a época, 26 (1912), Doc. 78, 308.
4 Esteban de Garibay y Zamalloa, Los XL libros d’elcompendio historial de las chronicas y universal historia de todos los reynos de España, 4 vols, in 3 (Amberes, 1571), 2: 1448. José M. Doussinague, Un proceso por envenenamamiento. La muerte de Felipe el hermoso (Madrid, 1947), 111. Bernaldez, op. cit., 484, 515. See Peter Martyr’s eloquent comment on the heavy rains of late 1504. Pedro Mártir de Anglería, Epistolario, José López de Toro, trans, and ed., 4 vols. (Madrid, 1953-57) (Documentos inéditos para la historia de España, 9-12), 10: 92-94. See also Juan de Vallejo’s comments on the severe winter at Salamanca. Juan de Vallejo, Memorial de la vida de Fray Francisco Jiménez de Cisneros, Antonio de la Torre y del Cerro, ed. (Madrid, 1913), 87.
5 Libro de las bulas, 2: 314-15v. Bernaldez, op. cit., 515.
6 Hamilton, Earl J., American Treasure and the Price Revolution in Spain, 1501-1650, Harvard Economic Studies, 43 (Cambridge, Mass., 1934), 320CrossRefGoogle Scholar. I have rounded the figures to multiples of five. Some other recorded prices were substantially higher than these. See Clemencín, op. cit., 551-52. See also the prices recorded for these (and other) years in Manuel Gonzalez Jiménez, El concejo de Carmona a fines de la edad media (1464-1523) (Sevilla, 1973), 283.
7 Galindez, Lorenzo (de) Carvajal, “Anales breves del reinado de los Reyes Católicos,” Biblioteca de autores españoles, 70 (Madrid, 1878), 556Google Scholar. Garibay y Zamalloa, op. cit., 2: 1451. Bernaldez, op. cit., 516-17. Doussinague, op. cit., 111-12. If we may believe Juan de Vallejo, who recognized 1506 as a year of “muy grandísima seca,” the villa of Villunbrales near Valladolid had sufficient rain for a good crop, the result of a procession and prayer conducted by Jiménez de Cisneros. Vallejo, op. cit., 89.
8 Ibarra y Rodríguez, op. cit., 165, gives a number of prices up to 1000 mvds. A stone monument on the Seville alhóndiga recorded three ducados or 1125 mvds. Ortiz de Zúñiga, op. cit., 3: 206. Our highest known prices in the 1473-74 shortage were 700, 800, and 1000 mvds. See the sources cited in note 1.
9 The termination of the tasa followed a recommendation of the cortes. See Cortes de los antiguos reinos de León y de Castilla, publicadas por la Real Academia de la Historia, 5 vols. (Madrid, 1882-1903), 4: 228-29. Ibarra y Rodríguez, op. cit., 100. Bernaldez, op. cit., 517.
10 Alonzo de Santa Cruz, Crónica de los Reyes Católicos (hasta ahora inédita) in Juan de Mata Carriazo, ed., 2 vols., (Sevilla, 1951) (Publicaciones de la Escuela de estudios hispano-americanos de Sevilla, 49), 2: 103. Santa Cruz’s statement that half the population of Spain perished in 1507 is an obvious exaggeration. It may represent a misreading of Bernaldez, op. cit., 518-19 (see below). Peter Martyr in Burgos and other cities of the north continued to speak of peste through March, 1507. Mártir de Anglería, op. cit., 10: 170, 175, 178. Large-scale pestilence and death are recorded in Jaén in a document of September, 1507. Jaén, Archivo histórico provincial, 11: fol. 457. We have a number of references to pestilence in Barcelona in 1506-07. See Antonio Capmany y de Monpalau, Memorias históricas sobre la marina, comercio y artes de la antigua ciudad de Barcelona, 2 vols. (Barcelona, 1963), 2, pte. 2: 989. Manual de novells ardits vulgarment apellat dietari del antich consell Barceloni, 3 (Barcelona, 1894), 201 ff. Bernaldez, op. cit., 538, states that half the population of his community (near Seville) died and that the pestilence and hunger were the worst since the time of Justinian (sixth century A.D.). Pedro Mexia speaks of a “very cruel pestilence” throughout Castile in 1507 and states that over 6000 died in Holy Week in Seville. Pedro Mexia, Historia del emperador Carlos V, Juan de Mata Carriazo, ed. (Madrid, 1945), 38. Both Philip the Fair and the Duque of Medina Sidonia died in the plague. See Doussinague, op. cit., and J.L. Cano de Gardoqui and A. de Bethencourt, “Incorporación de Gibraltar a la corona de Castilla (1436-1508),” Hispania, 26 (1966), 363. The Relaciones topográficas of the Philip II period occasionally refer back to the mortandad of 1506-07. But they also seem to confuse the 1506-07 crisis with famines and plagues of other years. See e.g., Carmelo Viñas y Mey and Ramón Paz, eds., Relaciones histórico-geográfico-estadísticas de los pueblos de España hechas por iniciativa de Felipe II. Provincia de Madrid (Madrid, 1949), 42, 291, 587. Doussinague, op. cit., 111 ff. includes other citations on the plague, and the industrious student will discover still others scattered throughout the literature.
11 Bernaldez, op. cit., 517.
12 Jaén, Archivo Histórico Provincial, 11: fols. 414, 457. Almería, Archivo municipal, leg. 906, no. 30.
13 Bernaldez, op. cit., 535 ff. Gonzalez Jiménez, op. cit., 255.
14 Almería, Archivo de la Catedral, Libro de Actas, l, 59, “Indice alfabético,” fol. 62r. I have not seen Pedro Bellot, Anales de Orihuela (siglos XIV-XVI) (Orihuela, 1954-56), 2: 96, cited by Juan Ignacio Gutiérrez Nieto, “Evolución demográfica de la cuenca del Segura en el siglo XVI,” Hispania, 29 (1969), 29, according to which 5000 deaths occurred in Orihuela in 1507 and 1508.
15 Bernaldez, op. cit., 161, 165. Bartolomé Bennassar, Valladolid au siècle d’or. Une ville de Castille et sa campagne au XVIe siècle (Paris, 1967), 278, 281. Gutiérrez Nieto, op. cit., 38-39, announces a study in preparation on the “crisis cerealista y epidémica de 1507-1508 en la Mancha y Extremadura,” based on the important “Libros de visitas de la Orden de Santiago” in the Archivo Histórico Nacional.
16 Hamilton, op. cit., 319-20.
17 Wheat prices in Valencia ran substantially higher in the seven years 1502-08 than in the seven years 1509-16, but the year of the highest prices was 1508. Ibid., 328-30.
18 Raventos, Emilio Giralt, “En torno al precio del trigo en Barcelona durante el siglo XVI,” Hispania, 18 (1958), 60.Google Scholar
19 Libro de las bulas, 2: 314v-15r. José Angel Garcia de Cortázar y Ruiz de Aguirre, “El aprovisionamiento de trigo en Vizcaya a fines del siglo XV,” Homenaje al Excmo. Sr. D. Emilio Alarcos García, 2 vols. (Valladolid, 1965-67), 2: 683-96.
20 A summary and bibliography of this large subject may be found in Braudel, Fernand P. and Spooner, Frank, “Prices in Europe from 1450 to 1750,” The Cambridge Economic History of Europe, 4 (Cambridge, 1967), 374–486Google Scholar. The most comprehensive summary on sixteenth-century climate derives from the Aspen, Colorado conference of 1962. It is tabulated in Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie, Times of Feast, Times of Famine: A History of Climate since the Year 1000, Barbara Bray, trans. (Garden City, N.Y., 1971), Appendix 15, 378-80.
21 The point is made for sixteenth-century Spain by Ibarra y Rodriguez, op. cit., 15, 137; and Thobar, Ramón Carande, Carlos V y sus banqueros. La vida económica en Castilla (1516-1556), 3 vols. (Madrid, 1949–68), 1: 128 ffGoogle Scholar. See especially Carande’s list of twenty-five places in New Castile in 1518-19. Their simultaneous grain prices range from 80 to 174.
22 Bernaldez, op. cit., 516, 518. Differences between Granadine and other towns may have been accentuated by irrigation systems in the former. See the observations (1494) of Jerónimo Miinzer on this point in Garcia Marcadal, J., ed., Viajes de extranjeros por España y Portugal desde los tiempos mas remotos hasta fines del siglo XVI (Madrid, 1952), 359.Google Scholar
23 See the interesting remarks on this subject by Bennassar, op. cit., 93 ff.
24 For a discussion of seasonal changes in wheat prices see Bennassar, op. cit., 211. The historic agricultural schedule is recorded in the Spanish menologies, studied by Baroja, Julio Caro, “La vida agraria tradicional reflejada en el arte español,” Estudios de historia social de España, 1 (Madrid, 1949), 45–138Google Scholar. Gabriel Alonso de Herrera, Obra de agricultura (Alcalá de Henares, 1513) is the classic work of the period on Spanish agriculture.
25 Bernaldez, op. cit., 538.
26 Hamilton, op. cit., 241 et passim.
27 Ibid., 278-79. Hamilton records one figure per year. We cannot be certain in any particular case whether the single figure represents an extreme, an average, or something in between these, nor do we know the precise date. Hamilton’s real wage figure is 92.47 for 1506 and 99.68 for 1507. His 1530 figure is 91.35 and his 1599 and 1600 figures are 91.40 and 91.31 respectively. All others from 1501 to 1650 are 93 or more.
28 Chaunu’s concern is with the relation between Spanish prices and Spanish American shipping, and he argues for a close correlation in the period 1501-10 as in other periods. For him the year of crisis is 1508, after which shipping, lagging behind prices, underwent a decline. In Vol. 2 he makes reference to famine and epidemic in the period 1503-08, citing José Pulido Rubio. Thus his awareness of the famine and epidemic is quite limited. In Vol. 8 he makes some interesting speculations on the interrelations of epidemic, price, and shipping. Pierre and Huguette Chaunu, Seville et l’Atlantique (1504-1650) (Paris, 1955-59), 2: 16; 8: pt. 1, no. 1, 72-76.
29 Suárez Fernández, in Historia de España, Ramón Menéndez Pidal, comp., 17, pte. 1 (Madrid, 1969), 63-65. Cf. ibid., 17, pte. 2 (Madrid, 1969), 615, where the same author speaks of 1504 as a year of an extreme wheat shortage in Andalucía.
30 Vicens Vives, op. cit., 304-05.
31 Bernaldez, op. cit., 484. Galindez de Carvajal, op. cit., 555. Martir de Angleria, op. cit., 10: 143-44. Thus Bernaldez, who connects the crisis with the death of Isabella, is our principal source for the climatic conditions. Note also Marineo Siculo’s remarkable observations on the deterioration of everything following the queen’s death. Lynn, op. cit., 172-73.
32 For summaries see Defourneaux, Marcelin, Daily Life in Spain in the Golden Age, Newton Branch, trans. (London, 1970), 91 ff.Google Scholar, and Pérez, Joseph, La révolution des “Comunidades” de Castille (1520-1521) (Bordeaux, 1970), 21 ffGoogle Scholar. For a specific case see Gonzalez Jiménez, op. cit., 252-53 et seq.
33 Libro de las bulas, 2: 314r ff.
34 Cortes de los antiguos reinos, 4: 227-28. Almada Rodríguez et al., eds., op. cit., 39, 42. Ibarra y Rodríguez, op. cit., 51 ff., 99. A large number of provisions relating to import, export, transport, storage, etc., may be found in Francisco Bejarano, ed., Catálogo de los documentos del reinado de los Reyes Católicos existentes en el Archivo municipal de Málaga (Malaga, 1961), 4, 27, 49, 50, 52-53, 54, et seq.
35 Libro de las bulas, 2: 314r-16v. Cortes de los antiguos reinos, 4: 229.
36 A statement of the traditional view is Clemencín, op. cit., 26, 179. Modern inquiries include Highfield, J.R.L., “The Catholic Kings and the Titled Nobility of Castile,” in Hale, J.R., Highfield, J.R.L., and Smalley, Beryl, eds., Europe in the Late Middle Ages (London and Evanston, III., 1965), 358–85Google Scholar. Gerbet, Marie-Claude, “Les guerres et l’accès à la noblesse en Espagne de 1465 à 1592,” Mélanges de la Casa de Velazquez, 8 (1972), 295–326CrossRefGoogle Scholar. María Guilarte, Alfonso, El régimen señorial en el siglo XVI (Madrid, 1962)Google Scholar.
37 There is a sense in which Suárez Fernandez’s and Vicens Vives’s explanations may be called standard or normal for a later time. Cf. the observations on agriculture in Carande, op. cit., 115 ff. The term “expulsion” with reference to the Moriscos is usually reserved for the events of 1569-70. Vicens Vives is seemingly referring to the act of 1502 requiring the Moslems (not Moriscos) of Granada to convert to Christianity or move to Africa.
38 See note 20.
39 On the preoccupation with the long term see Braudel, Fernand, “Histoire et sciences sociales. La longue durée,” Annales, economies, sociétés, civilisations, 13 (1958), 725–53CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Cf. Bennassar’s effort to identify cycles in the sixteenth-century wheat price in Valladolid and to include the 1506-07 crisis in a secular-cyclical pattern. See Bennassar, op. cit., 281-82.
40 Le Roy Ladurie, op. cit., 92-93.
41 Tilly, Louise A., “The Food Riot as a Form of Political Conflict in France,” Journal of Interdisciplinary History, 2 (1971-72), 24 et passim.Google Scholar
42 Giralt Reventos, op. cit., 42 et passim; Capmany y de Monpalau, op. cit., 2, pte. 2, 841 ff.; and Hamilton, op. cit., 242, 257.
43 Le Roy Ladurie, op. cit., 378.