pan - History Lab

Provision of Charles III on the riots that occurred in the town of Madrid between 23rd and 26th March

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

The Esquilache riot was the most important social, economic and political revolt of the 18th century (1766). The shortage of basic foodstuffs, including bread, and the speculation of hoarders were two of the reasons that led the lower social classes to riot against the rulers. In the case of the Motín de Esquilache, the revolt ended with the march, via Cartagena, of the Marquis, who had to leave the peninsula in the face of the events and the demands of the lower social classes.

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Bread prices in Trujillo (Cáceres) between 1551 and 1610

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

As in many other places in Castile, one of the problems in Trujillo was to ensure sufficient food and provisions to meet social demand. Inflation in the 16th century affected many basic necessities, with the price of bread being a significant example. The data show large inter-annual fluctuations, reaching the highest levels in years when the price of bread soared, mainly due to bad harvests.
From 1570 onwards, the price of bread fell progressively and then rose again from 1575 onwards, maintaining rising prices for almost 10 years. As can be seen at the beginning of 1580, at the end of the 16th century and at the beginning of the 17th century, the price of bread reached progressive peaks, reaching its highest point in 1606 and falling again until 1610.
The rise in the price of wheat led the municipality to try to fix the price of some primary goods such as bread. Thus, its manufacture and distribution was regulated by ordinances and agreements that were revised every week.

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Bread price regulation system in Madrid (1498)

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

The bread trade was the most important in the food markets. The city of Madrid had systems of intervention to ensure the supply of this staple foodstuff; a policy that went beyond municipal boundaries and became a matter of state as urban demand increased. In 1498, a municipal ordinance was published in Madrid for its supply, establishing a direct relationship between the price of bread and the price of flour. The resource shows the system of regulating prices according to tables of equivalence, values which did not result in a greater range of profits for the baker. In fact, while the sale of bread was regulated by controlled prices, the acquisition of raw materials cost more and, although profits were obtained, profits were lower in order to ensure a distribution that could be afforded by the working classes, whose spending on the acquisition of this product was the main item of family expenditure.

The post Bread price regulation system in Madrid (1498) first appeared on History Lab.

Price of wheat and price of barley in 17th century Spain (Annual averages)

ad_hlab_min — Sat, 19 Feb 2022 16:29:02 +0000

The post Price of wheat and price of barley in 17th century Spain (Annual averages) first appeared on History Lab.

Bread production in the Archbishopric of Toledo (annual averages expressed as index numbers)

ad_hlab_min — Sat, 19 Feb 2022 16:28:57 +0000

Different considerations have been made about the evolution of the Spanish economy during the 17th century, in which the existence of a generalised and prolonged crisis in the Spain of the misnamed minor Habsburgs was acknowledged. However, during that period the number of active people did not fall, as agricultural production had to register a downward trend, where there was a “hidden unemployment” and the decrease in the cultivated area allowed the average quality of the cultivated land to improve and the breeding of livestock to expand. Within the Archbishopric of Toledo are the archpriestships of Alcalá de Henares, Alcaraz, Alcolea de Torote, Brihuega, Buitrago, Calatrava, Canales, Escalona, Guadalajara, Hita, Illescas, Madrid, Montalbán, Ocaña, Rodillas, Santa Olalla and Maqueda, Talamanca, Talavera de la Reina, Zorita de los Canes and Almoguera and the Vicariate of Puebla de Alcocer. Before the end of the third quarter of the 16th century, the upward trend in grain harvests in the Archbishopric of Toledo as a whole was reversed. The grain harvests of the Archbishopric registered an intense downward movement between the last years of the third quarter of the 16th century and the end of the decade of the thirties of the 17th century, to the point that at this date in the sixteenth century the average annual production of cereals was barely more than half of that obtained around 1570. When the depression bottomed out at the end of the 1930s, a real reversal of the trend did not take place until shortly before the 1970s. Five phases can be distinguished: between 1570 and 1580, grain yields fell by 13%; there was a brief recovery between 1580 and the first years of the 17th century thanks to the good harvests of 1585-1587; in the third, the first decade of the sixteenth century, yields fell, with the average level about 18% lower than in the previous phase, and production stagnated. Finally, the 1630s proved to be a dramatic decade for Castilla la Nueva, where the average level of grain harvests fell by 20%. In short, in the Archbishopric of Toledo, the key periods of the contractionary movement were the 1630s, the central part of the first decade of the 17th century and the years between 1570-1580.

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