Justicia - History Lab

Manual calendar and guide for strangers in Madrid

ad_hlab_min — Sat, 19 Feb 2022 16:32:51 +0000

An annual publication founded in 1722 by Luis Félix de Miraval y Spínola, who in the same year obtained the marquisate of Miraval, and Gaspar Ezpeleta, and which until 1734 was entitled Kalendario particular. From 1725 its printer was Juan Sanz, then his heirs, and from 1730, Antonio Sanz, his nephew, who in 1769 ceded the rights to the Spanish Crown in exchange for a lifelong pension. The most complete collection was acquired by the Royal Academy of History, and the one in the possession of the National Library of Spain begins in 1744, stamped with a privilege held by Antonio Sanz, printer to the King and his council. The title page states that it contains the births of the kings, queens, the seventy members of the Sacred College of Cardinals, the princes of Europe, the ministers who make up His Majesty’s courts in their kingdoms, with an indication of their private residences in Madrid. In short, it is a very complete guide to the State Administration of the ancien régime, with an indication of its executive and consultative bodies (royal councils, boards), scientific and academic institutions and other bodies and entities that the Spanish monarchy created throughout the eighteenth century (including the Royal Public Library itself), the book includes the names of the archbishops and bishops of Spain and the Indies, the composition of the courts (chancillerías and audiencias), the list of kingdoms and provinces and partidos, with the names of their governors, intendants and corregidores. It begins with the Gregorian calendar, with the saints’ calendar for each day and astronomical data, and also contains the 40-hour jubilee, as well as statistical data on marriages, births and deaths in the parishes of Madrid, and a summary of the sick in their hospitals. There is also another section on the days on which the court dresses up or the days on which the mails come and leave the General Post Office of Castile in this court, or the list of the Knights of the Golden Fleece. It will also include the values of Spanish coins and their exchange values with the most important coins in Europe. From 1768 it will be accompanied by the Estado militar de España, with its own title page, with the names of the captains and lieutenant generals of His Majesty’s Army, field marshals, brigadiers and naval officers, etc. In the 1767 edition he began to include engravings, such as those of Charles III, the Princes of Asturias and the one of the Palace of Aranjuez, and later those of Charles IV and Queen Maria Luisa, before including those of Ferdinand VII and his daughter, the young Queen Isabella II, in the 19th century. He would also print a dozen maps of Spain and plans by Tomás López and his sons. In 1774, it left the Royal Printing House of the Gazette, and included the lists of knights of Charles III, professors of the Royal Studies, ambassadors and consuls and vice-consuls of the King abroad, the chronology of the kings of Spain and the calendar of the main fairs. In 1790 it already included an index, at the end or at the beginning, and in the 19th century, the lists of the Royal Order of Noble Ladies, the economic societies and the Royal Seminary of Nobles. Its volume increased over the years, from a hundred to over four hundred pages. During the invasion of the Napoleonic army, the kalendario did not appear in 1809 or 1810, and in 1811 it left the printing house of Miguel Segovia, printer to the Royal Navy, from the Royal Island of León in Cadiz, produced by two of the editors who were in charge of the main guides for foreigners, litigants, commerce and finance, and war and the navy in Madrid, and entitled Guía patriótica de España (Patriotic Guide to Spain). It includes an introduction narrating the difficulties encountered in producing it and will consist of two parts. The first part will give an account of the legitimate government, its courts and military state, and the second of the corps and officers of the armies resident in Cadiz, as well as the list of deputies of the Cortes, accompanied by an article. Those of 1812 and 1813 were entitled Guía política de las España, and were also printed in Cádiz, the first in the office of the widow of Comes, and the second in the Imprenta Nacional. In this case it is written by a single editor, and includes patriotic ephemeris of the main events that have been taking place during the war against the French armies, and introductory articles to the list of the legislative body, list of deputies and of the court and secretariat of State of Cortes, executive power, supreme council of Regency, Council of State, ambassadors and commanders of the armies. The 1813 edition will include an addendum entitled Exércitos nacionales. On the return of Ferdinand VII, it returned to its previous title and to practically the same contents as it had published during the old regime, until during the liberal triennium, when it again changed its title and some of its contents, once again including the list of deputies to the Cortes and the new administrative institutions that the incipient liberal State was beginning to create. In 1821 it was entitled Guía de forasteros en Madrid, and in 1822 and 1823 Guía política y militar, printed at the Imprenta Nacional, formerly the Imprenta Real. For its part, the Estado militar de España, which had been published together with the kalendario, in 1821, 1822 and 1823 was entitled Estado de los ejércitos de la monarquía española (State of the Armies of the Spanish Monarchy). The calendar for 1825 is also interesting because the “purified” did not appear in the lists. This publication would continue to be published until 1837, when it was replaced by the Guía de forasteros en Madrid, which included engravings of the queen governor Maria Cristina and her daughter, Isabel II, and gave an account of the new organisation that the liberal state was creating to replace that of the old regime, the kalendario is therefore a basic source of information for understanding both the evolution of the state structure and the holders of its numerous organs and institutions, from the absolutist and enlightened monarchy of the eighteenth century to the first decades of the construction of the liberal state, with its two most influential episodes, the constituent Cortes of Cadiz and its epigone of the triennium.

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View of the Royal Chancery of Granada

ad_hlab_min — Sat, 19 Feb 2022 16:30:03 +0000

The Royal Chancery of Granada was a judicial body established by the Catholic Monarchs in 1500, which became effective on the death of the Queen in 1505. This new institution inherited the powers of the previous Royal Court and Chancery of Ciudad Real, which had been established in that city in 1494. Its transfer to Granada had two main causes: the symbolic role that this city played in the reign and the monarchs’ intention to dominate this area politically. Its judicial powers extended to the territory south of the Tagus River, while the northern territories would be under the supervision of the Royal Court and Chancery of Valladolid. In 1531 King Charles I ordered the construction of the Palace of the Chancery, today located in Plaza Nueva, which was completed in 1587. The project was designed by the architect Francisco del Castillo el Mozo and the stonemasons Martín Díaz de Navarrete and Pedro Marín, and the sculptural work was carried out by Alonso Hernández. The courtyard has been attributed to the design of Diego de Siloé. During the 18th century, this institution gradually lost power and competences with the creation of the figure of the intendant. It finally disappeared in 1834 with the definitive establishment of liberalism in Spain

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Executed in Valencia (1450-1500)

ad_hlab_min — Sat, 19 Feb 2022 16:29:56 +0000

During the modern age, punitive justice was administered both by the king’s officials and by the inquisitorial power, which had its own courts. In addition to the traditional crimes such as theft, swindling, piracy or murder, there were other types of crimes that were also punishable from the mental and material parameters of the time. It should be borne in mind that, being in a different historical moment, the social conventions on what type of conduct constituted a crime or not were also different. In this case, according to the studies of Antonio Catalá Sanz and Pablo Pérez García, the following were considered as crimes constituting the maximum penalty: heresy and blasphemy, sodomy and bestiality, crimes of lèse-majesté, rebellion, falsehood, etc. In this case, we have a graph showing those executed in Valencia over a period of 50 years during the modern age. It can be useful to bring students closer to questions related to criminality or punitive justice in other periods, highlighting the need to take into account the historical context at any given time.

The post Executed in Valencia (1450-1500) first appeared on History Lab.

Women prosecuted for the crime of clandestine prostitution (1479-1518)

ad_hlab_min — Sat, 19 Feb 2022 16:29:20 +0000

In the 15th century, the city of Valencia was a commercial emporium and a cosmopolitan location in the Mediterranean. The commercial boom of the city, accentuated in the 15th century, also implied an increase in social and economic inequalities and therefore an increase in the population on the threshold of misery. Prostitution also obeyed these general dynamics of misery, but also an opportunity for enrichment, given that the city was a continuous flow of travellers and merchandise, as Pablo Pérez García says. Prostitution was regulated by the kings of the Crown of Aragon, creating an institutionalised building, the brothel, which was under the authority of the cities. For the study of prostitution in Valencia, we have the Llibres de Cédules and the accounting books of the urban court. However, these sources have a number of problems, such as their preservation and the lack of precision of the actors in question (Pablo Pérez García). The practice of prostitution outside the legal channels was punishable and in this sense, records are kept of women who had problems with the justice system, where they were often fined and even imprisoned. The social profile of these women who practised clandestine prostitution, according to Pablo Pérez García, was that of single/widowed women who carried out other secondary jobs such as maids, seamstresses, maids, etc.

The post Women prosecuted for the crime of clandestine prostitution (1479-1518) first appeared on History Lab.

Surveillance of sexuality. The prison for adulteresses. Calle de Atocha, 87 (Madrid)

ad_hlab_min — Sat, 19 Feb 2022 16:27:41 +0000

The video, 4.33 minutes long, is part of “Madrid, Ciudad de las Mujeres”, a cultural and touristic application where the traces of women in the city of Madrid are recovered http://madridciudaddelasmujeres.es/. As the video recounts, the galleys and hospices of Madrid have, since the beginning of modern times, been a place of reclusion and torture for a whole series of women who did not comply with the established rules. These included poor women, “rogues”, “fortune tellers”, prostitutes and adulteresses. As we entered the 18th century and under enlightened and charitable precepts, the quality and diversity of places of confinement for women diversified, with houses of seclusion and repentance where many women who practised prostitution would end up apart from society and subjected to a regime of beatitudes. Touched, veiled and living under a strict rule that they would only leave to get married or take religious vows. They were also places of confinement for a wide variety of petty crimes such as stealing clothes or vagrancy, and moral offences such as adultery or the highly punishable female adultery. A hospice was founded in the building at Calle de Atocha, 97, in Madrid, which also housed the Colegio de San Nicolás de Bari at the beginning of the 18th century, an institution for women who, “forgetful of their honour or conjugal fidelity, incurred in some crime of impurity”. The video tells the story of some of these condemned women.

The post Surveillance of sexuality. The prison for adulteresses. Calle de Atocha, 87 (Madrid) first appeared on History Lab.