42
THE MESTA
ordinances of 1492, which reflected the mediaeval suspicion of
such ‘ non-essential ’ services. Then too, the sheep owners were
hostile toward the middlemen because of the entangling contracts
into which the latter inveigled Mesta members in order to secure
future deliveries of wool. For example, in case the clip of any
wool grower happened to fall below the contracted quantity, the
deficiency usually had to be filled by the grower from purchases
made elsewhere, for which exorbitant prices were paid. It must
be noted, however, that neither the transactions of the reιιende-
dores nor the dealings in futures had been entirely prohibited;
and as Isabella studied the problem, she evidently came to appre-
ciate the possibilities of the service rendered by those engaging in
this form of trade. Finally she formally recognized the middle-
men and approved of their operations, under certain strict reg-
ulations, because such recognition meant further specialization of
industry and the segregation of the wool marketers into a sep-
arate group so that they might be definitely placed under royal
supervision.1
Even these transactions in wool, however, were usually re-
stricted to a few important concentration points, such as Medina
del Campo, Segovia, and Burgos. Not until the close of the Mid-
dle Ages were itinerant traders given any consideration or security
under the ordinances of the more remote towns and villages of
Castile. This attitude was not altogether unjust, for the smaller
communities felt a not altogether unmerited suspicion about the
title of wandering merchants to the goods which they offered for
sale.2 The expulsion of the gypsies and of the Moors after the
capture of Granada had freed the country of many roving ped-
dlers, whose dealings had given a most unsavory reputation to all
trading in rural districts. Another step which had greatly facil-
itated the wayside trading of the Mesta members was the or-
ganization in 1476 of the national Hermandad, the ‘ brotherhood ’
of rural police, which exterminated most of the lawlessness of the
l Arch. Ayunt. Cuenca, leg. 5, no. 98 (1'4.98); Arch. Mesta, Prov. i, 17 (1498).
2 The Navarrese law required that proof of ownership should be given by any
stranger offering sheep for sale in local markets. Nov. Recop. Leyes Nov. (Pam-
plona, 1735, 2 vols.), lib. i, tit. 20, ley 21.
MARKETING
43
country districts. For the first time in CastiIian history the
thinly populated southern plains were safe for honest migrating
traders.1
There was evident, then, for the first time, the development of
a distinctly national marketing, as contrasted with the older,
more restricted trading in metropolitan or large city centres.
The domestic commerce of mediaeval Castile was largely con-
centrated in a few widely scattered urban districts, which were
almost completely isolated from one another, except during the
brief periods of their annual fairs. The evolution of the wool and
sheep trade from this more or less irregular activity into an un-
hindered, nation-wide traffic, binding together the various com-
mercial centres, was the outcome of the nationalizing policy of
Ferdinand and Isabella. They made full use of the Mesta, its
itinerant attorneys and entregadores, in order to sweep aside
the obsolete restrictions by which local prejudice and suspicion
had prevented the entrance of the migratory traders into town
markets. In spite of this assistance, however, the wool trade
continued to be largely an export business because of the lack
of a native cloth industry, and the shipments were still concen-
trated very largely in Burgos and the north coast ports, as
described above.
The conspicuous feature of this newly stimulated domestic
trade in pastoral products was the sale of Mesta sheep in the
markets of towns along the canadas. Hitherto the herdsmen
had displayed little interest in this traffic in live animals. Because
of the encouragement given by Ferdinand and Isabella, however,
sheep trading became so general that a new term came into use
to designate animals offered for sale in wayside towns by the
Mesta shepherds. These market sheep were called merchaniegos,
m contrast to the Cabaniles, which were animals of the cabanas or
Hocks en route to pasture.2 With the vigorous support of the
' θn thɛ activities of the mediaeval town hermandades and the constitution of
e national body, see Merriman, The Riseof the Spanish Empire, ii (ιgι8), pp.
ʌɪ θɪɪe of the earliest instances of the term merchaniego is in Arch. Simancas,
fe^s' ^lvers°s Castilla, no. 117 (cα. 1480): “ merchaniegos que se mercare en las
as et en Ios otros Iugares fuera de Ios teπninos ” — a definition showing the use