IN the relations of the seigniorial elements and the monarchy this was a critical period for the latter, deciding as a result of the virtual, though not at the time apparent, victory of the kings that Castile was to become a power in the world. For that very reason the evolution of political institutions in this era was important, for on the development of monarchy depended the conquest of America, but they were also important because the institutions which were set up in the new world had noteworthy antecedents at this time. Influenced largely by the principles of the Roman law the kings aspired to absolute monarchy in a centralized state, with a view to overcoming the social and political strife resulting from the diffusion of power inherent in the seigniorial system. Their most dangerous enemies were the nobles, whose spirit of independence and self-esteem and whose vast wealth in lands and fighting men made them a powerful factor in themselves. They were yet stronger because the kings had to depend on them for military service since there was no large standing army, and because they in a measure developed a class consciousness in opposition to absolutism, becoming a nobility rather than remaining a mere aggregation of nobles. While the seigniorial ideal was not lacking in the towns, they were not nearly so dangerous to the monarchy, because they were usually as hostile to the nobility as the kings were. Often, however, they fought against the kings, or exacted concessions for their services. The task for the fulfilment of royal ideals was therefore a difficult one, requiring a sagacious type of monarch, such as in fact rarely appeared in the period. Circumstances fought better than the kings, and nowhere does this show forth more clearly than in a review of the political institutions of the era.

The external vicissitudes of the strife between the nobles and the kings have already been traced, and it would appear from them that the former gained the upper hand. In fact, however, their cause was already internally dead. One symptom of their approaching dissolution was the change in the practices of the nobles whereby they became more and more a court nobility, plotting in the shadow of the king (like the chancellor LÓpez de Ayala) instead of being semi-independent potentates on their own estates as formerly. Despite their class consciousness, parties arose within their ranks with distinct ideals, apart from personal ambition, dividing them against one another. Thus in Seville the GuzmÁn faction represented conservatism, while the Ponces were radical. Most important of all were the blows resulting from the social and economic changes which deprived the nobles of their serfs and created a new form of wealth in the hands of the middle class, an element better fitted than the old nobility to acquire and develop the new resources. The eagerness with which the nobles took up the practice of primogeniture, leaving their estates nearly intact to their eldest sons so that their house and their name might not be lost, showed that they realized the force of the new order of things and were taking thought for the future. In earlier times, when wealth was territorial and serfs were numerous, the land-rich nobility had been secure, but that day had passed.

The great representative of absolutism was Alfonso X, not that he invented the idea or was the first to attempt its achievement, but because he formulated the program more clearly than any of his predecessors, embodying it in his legislation, and because he received the first shock in defence of these principles. He enacted that the legislative, judicial, and military powers and the right to coin money were fundamental, inalienable rights of the king, who could not give them away for a period longer than his own life, and declared that the lords could not exercise any judicial or other sovereign powers on their estates except those which had been granted to them by the king, or which they had enjoyed by immemorial custom. His laws also prescribed certain forms of etiquette which should be employed in treating with the king, establishing the ceremonial which has always served as such a prop for monarchy. The divine origin of royal power was asserted. Independence of the Holy Roman Emperors was specifically proclaimed, but a measure of subjection to the pope was admitted. The absolutism of Alfonso X did not pretend, even in principle, that the king might exercise arbitrary or tyrannical authority; Alfonso declared that the king was bound to observe the law and deal justly with the people, acting as their guardian and administrator, and granting them certain rights to inspect his conduct. Those who wrongly possessed themselves of the royal power, or made bad use of it, were declared to be tyrants and not legitimate kings. The people, on the other hand, owed respect, obedience, and loyalty to the legitimate king, and even a species of guardianship to prevent his non-fulfilment of obligations. Alfonso X was not able to sustain his principles in open conflict, but they remained as the ideal of future kings, even though some of them were modified by the legislation of later reigns; thus Alfonso XI declared that sovereign rights might be acquired from the crown by prescription, except the taxing power and high justice (or the hearing of cases on appeal), and that the kings could alienate any of their sovereign powers except those of high justice, coinage, and war.

Two fundamental results of the centralizing, absolutist policy of the kings were the final establishment of hereditary succession and the development of consultive and other bodies about the king, the forerunners of modern bureaucracy. The former has already been referred to. Alfonso himself was the first to break his own law in this respect, but after his reign the principle was definitely recognized. The pomp and ceremonial of royalty increased the number of officials whose principal functions were those of adding splendor to the court,—such, for example, as the king’s cup-bearer, butler, and chamberlain. Great nobles also sent their sons to court to be educated under the protection and with the favor of the king, and these young men formed a special royal guard. In addition there began to be an infinity of servants, notaries, doctors, and others occupying posts of a less ornamental character. The most important novelty of the period was the development of the Consejo Real.

The kings had long been surrounded by a body of nobles and prelates called the Consejo Real, or Royal Council, which advised them in matters of government, or sat as the Cort, or supreme court, in appeals from lower jurisdictions, but its membership and functions had not been very clearly established, for it dealt indiscriminately with any subject upon which the king might want advice. One important reform was the introduction of representatives of the popular element in this body. Different kings, from Sancho IV on, decreed that a certain number of the council should be “good men,”—or members of the untitled, secular class,—although the practice did not become fixed. A law of Juan I in 1385 provided that the council should be composed of twelve men, of whom four should be plebeians. Two years later it was required that the last-named should be letrados,—that is, men learned in the law,—and shortly afterward they began to be called oidores (hearers of cases). Juan II divided the council into two bodies, one of government, the other of justice. It was not until the time of Ferdinand and Isabella, however, that the Consejo Real acquired real stability.

There were important developments, too, in the general administrative and judicial hierarchy, although with a mixture of the two functions. The hierarchy of officialdom, from the lowest grade to the highest, with especial regard to comparative judicial authority, ran from the alcaldes of the towns through merinos mayores or the adelantados, the alcalde del rey (royal alcalde) of the court, and the adelantado mayor (or chief justice of Castile) to the king himself. In some jurisdictions cases in first instance came before alcaldes del rey (different from the above-named) with an appeal to merinos menores[43] and merinos mayores, or directly to the latter, and thence upward. The merinos menores limited themselves to jurisdiction in certain criminal cases. The merinos mayores were, like the adelantados, governors of large districts as well as judges in cases of appeal, for which latter purpose they were assisted by men acquainted with the law. They took the place of many of the former adelantados. The adelantado mayor also had administrative functions, as the superior of the merinos and other officials below him. Alfonso X employed the old term, cort, in the new and more restricted sense of a royal judicial tribunal which acted for the king. In later reigns this came to be known as the chancillerÍa (chancery), or audiencia,[44]—which latter name was eventually transmitted to the Americas for bodies exercising similar functions.

Despite appearances, uniformity and order in the administrative and judicial organization were far from being completely established. Not only was there a great variety of jurisdictions, but there was also a great diversity in the law, for one region would differ radically from another. The towns, nobles, clergy, universities, and the great corporation of stock-raisers (the Mesta) all had officials of their own and exemption from royal jurisdiction. At the same time, great hermandades, or leagues of cities, were formed for the maintenance of public security against highwaymen or other disturbing elements, since royal activity in this regard left much to be desired, and these also had their separate jurisdictions.[45] The current toward centralization was very strong, however, being aided by the education in the Roman law of the letrados, whom the king employed as his officials (for these men were pronouncedly monarchical in sentiment), and by the increase in powers to which the adelantados and merinos mayores were attaining at the expense of the semi-independent elements. The successors of Alfonso X, especially Alfonso XI, furthered this policy of centralization. Royal judges began to appear in the towns, either taking the place of the formerly elected officials, or acting concurrently with them, for the kings took advantage of one pretext or another to make an opening for their own appointees. Another important reform was the division of the audiencia into two sections, one of which remained in Segovia, while the other went on circuit for brief periods in Andalusia. Under Juan II there appeared in the audiencia the official known as the fiscal, who at this time was a royal prosecuting attorney, but who later was to become one of the most important all-round administrative officials in Spanish and Spanish colonial government. As an example, too, of the extension of royal jurisdiction may be mentioned the so-called recourse of fuerza in cases of usurpation (by force,—hence fuerza) of lands or jurisdiction by the clergy. The trial of these cases was ordered to be held in the royal courts.

Punishments for crime continued to be atrocious, and torture was still employed, but only in the case of persons of bad reputation or when the accused bore the evidences of crime. Privilege still obtained to modify the punishment of the upper classes. A very notable reform was the introduction of the pesquisa, or inquisitorial investigation, for the bringing of an indictment, or accusation, of crime. Formerly the state had intervened when one individual charged another with crime, a process which resulted to the detriment of the weak, who would not dare to accuse the more powerful. The pesquisa not only introduced the grand jury function of an accusation by the state, without necessarily involving any individual accusers, but it also made crime partake more of the nature of a public offence than of a mere infringement of individual rights. The vulgar proofs, with one exception, were abolished, and the importance of written documents and the testimony of witnesses became more generally recognized. This also caused the rise of the lawyers, who, after a lapse of centuries, began again to be a noteworthy element in judicial affairs. The riepto, or duel, a special form of the wager of battle, was the only one of the vulgar proofs to remain in existence. This was a special privilege enjoyed only by those of noble blood. The duel was hedged in by a number of rules, one of which was that it must take place in the presence of the king. If the challenger were killed, the innocence of his opponent was proclaimed, but if the latter were killed, still protesting innocence, he was in this case, too, declared guiltless. The challenger could win by defeating his opponent without killing him, in which event the latter was banished, and half of his goods were granted to the king.

Although the expenses of the state were greater than formerly, the income was also greater. Many new forms of taxation were introduced: the royal monopolies on salt and mines; the alcabala, or tax on sales, which first became general in the reign of Alfonso XI; stamp taxes; and the consumo, or tax on all merchandise entering the city. These taxes fell upon goods or upon acts of individuals in connection with the state (as distinguished from the king) differing radically from the services of a feudal character, with a multitude of exceptions and privileges, which had formerly been the basis of the public income. Owing to the turbulence of the era and the excessive alienation of public wealth by grants of the kings to the nobles, receipts did not equal the royal needs, and resort was had frequently to loans, debasement of the coinage, and arbitrary confiscations of property. Even under the new system of taxation the nobles and clergy very rarely had to pay any of the numerous taxes, and privileges and exemptions were granted, much as before. Nevertheless, the methods employed contained the germ of a sound financial system, which was to develop in succeeding centuries. The collection of taxes was rented out as formerly, being given in charge usually of MudÉjares, Jews, or Marranos. Complaints against these collectors were so insistent that at one time churchmen were substituted for them,—without diminishing the complaints, for the fault lay in the system. There were royal financial officials for receiving the funds and examining accounts, but no organized treasury department was as yet developed.

The principal military fact of the era was the increase in the number of troops sustained by the king, but in other respects there was no fundamental difference from the preceding period. Technically there were advances in the art of war,—such as the development of a greater variety in the branches of the service and the introduction of powder,—but except for cannon of not very great utility the use of firearms did not become general. Complete armor came in with the white companies. The royal navy, initiated by Ferdinand III, was continued throughout the era, and this was a period of brilliant victories against the Moslems in the Mediterranean and the English in the north; on one occasion the Castilian admiral, Pero NiÑo, ravaged the English coast. No results of note seem to have proceeded from these victories, however.

This was the most flourishing epoch in the history of the free Castilian towns: their numbers and political importance increased; they received new privileges; and they made their presence felt in national affairs through their representatives in the Cortes. The most extreme example of municipal independence was provided by the towns of the north coast, which recognized the sovereignty of the Castilian king, but in fact governed themselves, even intervening in foreign affairs through the agency of their league. In the interior the towns were less independent politically and administratively, and in the fourteenth century their authority began to wane. The entry of royal judges into the towns has already been mentioned. In administration the kings were also able at length to exercise influence. This came about as a result of a number of political changes, such as the substitution of a life term in office for one of a period of years, the usurpation by the ayuntamiento (or body of municipal officials) of powers formerly exercised by the general assembly, the limitation of the right to hold office to the caballeros or to specified families, the disturbances at times of election, and the corruption which occasionally manifested itself in municipal administration. In the interests of internal peace the towns themselves often sought intervention by the kings, who did not fail to profit by the situation. Under Alfonso XI some towns began to be ruled by officials appointed by the king, and that monarch also created the post of corregidor,[46] a royal agent placed in many towns to watch the course of local affairs and represent the king, acting with the local alcaldes. The corregidores gradually acquired considerable influence, thereby reducing the power of the popularly elected officials. Internal municipal strife continued, but now the great families fought, not for the favor of the electorate, but for that of the king, since this had become the surer route to public office. The greater towns or cities suffered through the breaking away of the villages and rural districts which had formerly been subordinate to them. These villages were desirous of local autonomy, because the municipalities on which they depended were wont to exploit them or to exclude them from a share in government. The kings granted their petitions, thus weakening the greater towns, even if they did extend the institution of chartered municipalities. It should be said, however, that this decline of the towns, with the incidents accompanying it, was not uniform, for a number of them still retained their earlier liberties, including popular election, at the end of the period. In the seigniorial towns, especially those under ecclesiastical domination, there were frequent struggles with a view to reducing the lord’s intervention in local affairs, and these ended almost everywhere in a victory for the towns, which won a right to name their own officers and to possess much the same degree of liberty enjoyed by the royal towns. Here, too, the kings intervened, not only through the practice of judicial appeals to the royal courts, but also in other ways, even with armed forces, in order to reduce the power of the lords. The victory of the seigniorial towns lessened the power of the lords to an appreciable extent; the struggles of the lords with the kings were thenceforth maintained only through combinations of nobles, often with MudÉjar levies, joined at times by some of the towns.

The institution which most clearly represented the different factors of Castilian political life, but especially that of the municipalities, was the Cortes, which grew in importance until the fifteenth century, when it began to show signs of decline. The Cortes was hardly mentioned in the legislation of Alfonso X, for it did not comport well with his theories of absolutism, but the later kings paid it great consideration, seeking the aid of the popular branch against seigniorial anarchy. Its principal function continued to be economic, rather than legislative, through the grants of subsidies by the representatives of the towns. While these were not the only source of royal revenue they were so urgently needed that the Cortes was able to procure legislation from the kings in response to its petitions. The fourteenth century was particularly rich in ordinances of the Cortes, especially those arising from the meetings of 1329 (Madrid), 1348 (AlcalÁ), 1351 (Valladolid), 1366 (Burgos), 1371 (Toro), 1373 (Toro), 1377 (Burgos), 1379 (Burgos), and 1380 (Soria). In most cases the kings did not put the ordinances (which should rather be considered petitions) into effect, wherefore many of them were repeated time and again,—such, for example, as the legislation requested against the Jews, against the granting of Castilian benefices by the pope, against the abuses of royal officials and renters of taxes, and against the royal donations to the lords. In a number of instances the Cortes got what it asked for, even in cases affecting the king’s personal authority, such as a law in 1329 which prohibited the issuing of royal letters, or orders, in blank (whereby the possessor of the letter might insert anybody’s name he chose,—a practice which usually served to promote unjust ends, just as in the case of the lettres de cachet in France prior to the French Revolution), and another of 1348 extending the prohibition to letters which the kings were in the habit of granting to individuals empowering them to marry designated persons, with or without the latter’s consent. The kings also accepted petitions of a more general character, such as those asking that steps be taken for the suppression of banditry, the specification of the powers of royal officers, the correction of various abuses, the lowering of certain taxes, the regulation of disputes between the stockmen and the farmers, and the reform of judicial procedure. It was also affirmed several times,—in 1348, for example,—that there could be no new tax without a grant of the Cortes. The laws of Alfonso X insisted upon the king’s sole right to legislate, however, and this principle was maintained by the later kings, for despite the fact that a law of 1387 declared that the ordinances of the Cortes were irrevocable, unless by the act of a Cortes itself, the kings proceeded according to their own pleasure, apparently regarding the concession of 1387 as purely theoretical. The ordinances of the various Cortes appeared without method or plan, and lacked the full force of law, but they demonstrated the enormous activity of this body, and were in fact a basis for much legislation, both at the time and in later years. In organization the Cortes followed the general practices of the preceding era. Among the comparatively few novelties may be mentioned a law of Juan II, fixing the number of representatives from a town as two, and a law of 1351 granting immunity from arrest to members of the Cortes while that body was in session. Up to 1301 Castile and LeÓn had a separate Cortes, although there were a number of joint meetings before that date. After 1301 there was but a single Cortes for the entire kingdom.

Not only in the ordinances of the Cortes, but also in the general laws of the king without intervention of the Cortes, in grants of municipal charters, and in the innumerable private grants (often modifying the general law) this period was exceedingly rich in legislation. The fame of the laws of Alfonso X and of Alfonso XI has obscured the legislation of other reigns, but the output of the other kings was great in quantity, if less in importance than that of the two Alfonsos. Diversity was still a leading characteristic of the legislation. For example, from Alfonso X to 1299 at least 127 local charters were granted; in the fourteenth century at least 94; and in the fifteenth, at least 5, although many were reproductions or slight modifications of certain typical charters. The Fuero Juzgo continued to be the general law, but there was very little of it which was not contradicted or changed by other legislation. A tendency toward unification of the laws manifested itself in many ways, however. Alfonso X issued a municipal charter in 1254, variously named, but usually called the Fuero Real (Royal Charter), which was a new model, more complete and systematic than those which had preceded it, but based on those already in existence and on the Fuero Juzgo, preserving the Visigothic and early Leonese and Castilian principles of law. The Fuero Real was adopted as supplementary law for use in cases of appeal to the royal courts, but was also granted as the local charter of a great many towns, being the most extensively used of the typical charters, although by no means in a majority of the municipalities. To bring about unification at one stroke it is believed that Ferdinand III and Alfonso X projected a code to apply in all the land. Ferdinand is said to have begun the drawing up of the Setenario (or Septenary, so-called because it was to be in seven parts), which was completed by Alfonso after the former’s death. This code, if such it may be called, was never promulgated, and may rather have been intended as an encyclopedia of law. A similar compilation of the reign of Alfonso X was the EspÉculo (or Espejo) de todos los derechos (mirror of all the laws), but it, too, never became law, although used as a reference book by jurisconsults. Yet another such compilation appeared in this reign, the famous Leyes de las siete partidas (laws of the seven parts), or simply the Partidas, and this was to attain to a very different lot from the others just named.

The Partidas was the work of a number of jurisconsults under the inspection, and with more or less intervention, of Alfonso himself; these men began work in 1256 and finished it in 1265. Some of the laws and customs of Castile,—for example, the Fuero Juzgo and the Fuero Real,—were used as sources, but the preponderant influences were those of the canon law and the codes of the Roman emperor Justinian,—so much so that the Partidas amounted to an encyclopedia of these two sources of law, both of which were Roman in origin and very different from the customs, Visigothic and otherwise, at that time prevailing in Castile. Whether Alfonso intended that the Partidas should become the general law, or merely that it should serve as an encyclopedia, it was not promulgated in his day, and there were many later laws directly contradicting it. Nevertheless, it constantly gained ground, favored especially by lawyers and university men (both of which elements were strong partisans of the Roman law), being used as a book of reference and as a text-book. Finally the current in its favor became so strong that so far as it was not inconsistent with certain specified compilations it was declared to be law in the reign of Alfonso XI by the important ordinance of the Cortes of AlcalÁ (1348). This set forth that the decisions of that Cortes should be the principal fountain of Castilian law, followed in order of precedence by the Fuero Real, the other municipal charters, and finally by way of supplement by the Partidas, which was not to be enforced in such parts as it contradicted the privileges of the nobility, for these also were confirmed. Despite this lowly position of the Partidas and despite the vast quantity of later laws which took precedence of the above-mentioned hierarchy of sources, the ultimate victory of Alfonso’s code was assured from the time of its official promulgation. Without any statute to that effect it gradually became recognized, not as a mere supplementary source, but as the principal law of the land. Reformations of its text were undertaken to make it conform with the necessities of later times, but in substance the ideas of the original remained.

Next to the state the church was the most powerful and influential factor in Castile. This period was one of serious internal disturbance in the Castilian church and of relaxation in discipline. Despite the efforts of the popes and some Castilian prelates, the practice of barraganÍa continued. There also occurred such incidents as competitions in beauty between the nuns of Seville and Toledo, such instances of lack of discipline as the armed resistance of the dean of SigÜenza to the pope’s appointee as bishop, such turbulent intervention in politics as that of the bishops of Seville and Toledo in the time of Henry IV, and such cases of strife and violence as the attack of the monks of MelÓn on those of Armenteira, and that of the bishop of MondoÑedo on the Cistercians of Meyra. The disorder was enhanced owing to the appearance of the Great Schism in the church at large, in which Spanish countries were particularly interested, since several of the popes and anti-popes were of Spanish blood. On the other hand, the popes intervened more than ever in the affairs of the Castilian church. The ideas of Gregory VII of the supremacy of the papacy over temporal rulers did not fail to produce results in Castile. In the Partidas of the absolutist Alfonso X it was recognized that one legitimate way of acquiring the crown was by a grant of the pope, and that the latter might also absolve Castilian subjects from obedience to the king in certain cases. The election of bishops, normally the act of the cathedral canons, provoked many disputes between the kings and the popes, for the latter frequently intervened to impose their candidate, or even to make direct appointments, while the former claimed that no election was valid until it had their approval. One of the most unpopular practices of the popes was the appointment of foreigners to Castilian benefices, and frequent protests were made against it, but usually without avail. Although the popes got rather the better of the dispute over appointments to bishoprics, the kings manifested their prerogative in other respects, as by banishing prelates who worked against royal interests, by prohibiting the publication of papal bulls which might do harm to the state, and by employing the already mentioned process of recourse of fuerza in cases of ecclesiastical usurpations of jurisdiction. The Partidas named certain cases where clergymen lost their right of resort to ecclesiastical courts,—for example, suits between clerical and lay individuals over lands and inheritances. Even Alfonso XI, who (though somewhat immoral in private life) was very pious and notably generous with churches and monasteries, was very strict in guarding the rights of the state against the intrusions of the church. On the other hand, he confirmed the jurisdiction of the church courts in spiritual and related matters, including such cases as those arising out of church taxation, marriage, births, divorce, adultery, usury, and robbery in a sacred place, as well as those of a more purely religious or ecclesiastical character. The wealth of the church in lands increased greatly, both as a result of royal donations, and through the gifts of individuals, especially in the fourteenth century when the terror of the plagues which were sweeping Europe caused many to seek divine favor through benefactions to the church. There were a number of protests in the Cortes, especially in the case of the monasteries. The objections were based on social and financial, rather than anti-clerical, grounds, since the accumulation of landed wealth in the hands of the church tended to reduce the agricultural classes to a perpetual condition of mere usufruct or rental of lands, and resulted in vast tracts remaining uncultivated. Furthermore, these lands as a rule became exempted from taxation. The Partidas recognized the right of the church to receive such gifts, and no effectual steps were taken to check them. It may be mentioned here that this was the golden age of pilgrimages to holy places, due to religious devotion, or in fulfilment of vows, or from pure love of travel and adventure. Naturally, Santiago de Compostela was the chief objective of pilgrims in Spain, and to that place went not only Spaniards but also many thousands of persons from all parts of western Europe.