3∞
THE MESTA
strictions provided for the settlement of all disputes between
sheep owner and landowner by the latter’s alcalde or local judge.1
In order to make advantageous pasturage arrangements,
from the sheep owners’ point of view, the principle of collective
bargaining was strictly enforced by the Saragossan Casa, which
represented the most numerous group of migrants in the king-
dom. Every pasturage lease drawn up between a member of
that body and a private landowner or a town had to be ap-
proved by the Casa officials. Particular care was taken to
prevent the bidding of two Casa members against each other
by an arrangement guaranteeing the rights of the first tenant.
This was quite like the notorious posesiôn laws of the Casti-
lian Mesta.2 Another feature of mediaeval and early modern
Aragonese pasturage law and practice was the local prejudice
against the ownership, and in some cases even the temporary
occupation, of neighboring pasturage by forasteros — strangers
or non-residents.3 This prejudice was, as we shall see, common
in Castile as well; it represented, in fact, the perennial and uni-
versal antagonism between arable and pastoral, between seden-
tary and nomad.
We may say, then, that in most of these Mediterranean lands,
and especially in those where the migratory pastoral industry
was most extensive and best organized, the crown lands served
as the usual pasturage for the migrants. Secondly, it is evident
that respect for local property rights — both private and com-
munal—was insured by the towns themselves through their
agreements and leagues. Thirdly, the sheep owners in turn pro-
1 Capitulacidn y concordia otorgada рог . . . Albarracin (Madrid, 1691, 16 pp.),
par. 2; a copy of this rare print is in the Library of the Hispanic Society of America,
New York. Ordinaciones de la Casa de Ganaderos (Saragossa, 1640), pp. 52-54;
ibid., ed. of 1817, tit. 10; Arch. Casa Ganad., Mss. Privilegios, 25 (1501): a
charter summarizing the pasturage rights of the Casa in the alera forai or pasturage
shared in common by the towns of the Comunidades. On the alera forai and the
pasturage practices of the Comunidades, see also Borao, Voces Aragonesas, p. 150,
and Costa, Colectivismo Agrario, pp. 399-401, 561.
2 See below, p. 322. Ordenanςas de la Casa (1640), pp. 58 ff., 72.
3 Concordia de 1783, ii, fol. 109, citing Aragonese local legislation of 13n ff.
Acad. Hist., Traggia Mss., vi, B-14o, fol. ɪɪ: Aragonese town ordinances of 1284
ordering the expulsion of all such intruders from town pastures.
EARLY PASTURAGE PROBLEMS
301
tected themselves in the matter of securing adequate and mod-
erately priced pasturage by restricting competition among the
members of their organizations. With these three essential
features of the pasturage problem in mind, we may turn to the
consideration of the situation in Castde.
The oldest of the Spanish codes, the Fuero Juzgo of the Visi-
goths, made ample provision for the pasturage of the caminantes
or migratory flocks.1 They were to have unrestricted access to
all unenclosed lands (tierras abiertas), whether such lands be-
longed to the crown, to towns, or to private individuals. They
were not to stay more than two days on any one jurisdiction
without the owner’s consent; the right of the shepherds to cut
down any trees, save large ones, was recognized; and any branches
might be used as fodder for oxen. All of these points became
regular features of subsequent pasturage legislation down to and
including the first charters of the Mesta.
The pasturage clauses of the Visigothic code also reveal a prob-
lem which was destined to be of fundamental importance to this
industry, namely the question of enclosures. Although the
Fuero Juzgo recognized the right of a landowner to enclose his
property and to punish trespassing flocks, it favored the sheep
owners by forbidding towns to enclose their commons, to ob-
struct sheep-walks, or to hinder access to the waste lands {baldios)
of their vicinity.2
Many early town charters or fueros took up the same question
of allowing migrants the privilege of unrestricted access to the
local commons. As the Reconquest progressed, the Christian
kings lavished privileges upon loyal cities, monasteries, and mili-
tary orders, permitting the recipients to pasture their migratory
herds upon crown lands, baldios, and even town commons.3 Oc-
ɪ Fuero Juzgo, lib. 8, tit. 4, ley 27.
, Ibid., lib. 8, tit. 3, Ieyes 9, 10, and tit. 4, Ieyes 25, 28.
, Examples of these liberal pasturage privileges from the ninth to the fourteenth
century are found in Gonzalez, vi, pp. 2, 42, 218, 294, 319; Munoz, i, p. 244;
Loperraez Corvalan, Descrip. Obispado de Osma, iii, p. 92; Butt. Ord. Milit.
Calat., p. 150; Bull. Ord. Milit. Alcant., p. 128; Boletin Real Acad. Hist., viii, p.
59; Oihénart, Notitia Utriusque Vasconiae (Paris, 1637), p. 86.