I об
THE MESTA
common in the earlier centuries of the Mesta’s long history. I∏
1293 the Order of Calatrava secured such a privilege, by which its
brood mares and their pastures were freed from any interference
by the itinerant magistrates.1 During the fourteenth century the
towns of Buitrago, Plasencia, Caceres,2 Seville,3 and many others
were also favored with exemptions from entregador visitations in
return for services or subsidies to the crown. The comparative
docility of the Mesta in the later Middle Ages, and its readiness to
respect the rights of the municipalities, caused a lapse of interest
in these exemption privileges. It was not until the molestations
and extortions by the entregadores in the second half of the six-
teenth century that the southern and western landowners resur-
rected their ancient charters of exemption from the intrusions
and abuses of their northern visitors.
It is interesting to note that Badajoz, the chief city of the
western pasture lands, was the first to take drastic action in this
anti-Mesta campaign. The fight was waged with bitter enmity,
and was only to end some two centuries later with the complete
triumph of the towns, under the leadership of Vicente Paino у
Hurtado of Badajoz. The campaign opened in 1554 with a
stormy reception accorded to an entregador in that city, which
had thus far not been honored with such a visit. A description
of the event is interesting because the incident was the first of
many similar ones which illustrated the attitude of the public
mind toward the migrants and their magistrate. The first out-
burst after years of smouldering hostility marked the beginning
of a long period of active assaults on the entregador and the
institution which he represented.
In the fall of 1554 there arrived in Badajoz an entregador,
whose boldness in venturing into the long exempt capital of the
1 Acad. Hist., Ms. Salazar, I-41, fols. 232-237.
’ In Cdceres the entregador was checked by active participation of the local
alcaldes in his court sessions. See above, p. ɪoɪ, n. 2.
s Although the audiencia or high court of Seville was forbidden to interfere in
any way with decisions of the entregadores (see below, p. 112, n. 2), the itinerant
magistrates were seldom able to hold court within the jurisdiction of Seville. It
was only by the use of decrees of the Royal Council (e.g , in 1488, Arch. Mesta,
C-ю, Cumbres Mayores, a suburb of Seville) that the Mesta was able occasionally
to enforce its privileges in the Andalusian capital.
the Entregador and the towns 107
pasture districts was in itself the best proof of the growing arro-
gance of the Mesta and its judiciary. He was received, not by the
usual ringing of church bells and the assembled dignitaries of the
town government, but “ with much fury and with most offensive
words, by bailiffs and other town retainers bent upon ejecting him
from the place.” Being unable to accomplish this, “ they took,
him to the public jail, surrounded by a great jeering crowd, which
rained blows upon him and shouted ugly words at him, molesting
him in many other ways unmentionable.” ɪ All of this was quite
true, said the city in its reply to the charge brought by the Mesta
before the Royal Council, and a repetition of the performance was
cheerfully assured to any other entregador who might undertake
a similar violation of the ancient privileges and exemptions of
Badajoz. The whole incident was subsequently repeated in
substance in other towns, though with less violence and more
legal, but none the less stubborn, resistance.
Townspeople and officials were beginning to take courage and
to rise against constant intrusions of the entregadores in local
affairs. The chief alcalde of Burgos even insisted upon bringing
suit against the entregador who visited that city, but was checked
by the Royal Council.2 The campaign of denunciation continued
in the Cortes throughout the reign of Philip II. Protests were
made against ‘ the thousands of retainers in the staffs of the en-
tregadores, whose devastations totalled over a hundred million
maravedis a year.’3 The deputies asked that the local officials
be given at least some powers in the regulation of this wholesale
tax-gathering,4 but no satisfactory reply was ever made to these
demands. The statutes and the Mesta codes were not revised,
probably because the excesses of the entregadores had not yet
been given a legal basis. When, however, such a basis was given
to them, in the reign of Philip IV, the towns had found other
ɪ Arch. Mesta, B-ι, Badajoz, 1554.
2 Ibid., B-4, Burgos, 1567.
3 Cortes de Castilla, xiii, p. 387 (1594). In 1587, the Cortes fix, pp. 261-265)
had asked that the powers of the entregador to name his bailiffs be restricted.
4 Ibid., xiv, pp. 446-455 (1596); i, p. 356 (1563). complaints that the Mesta’s
notaries deprived the local ones of much business in the court of the entregador.
See also Concordia de 1783, ii, fols, ɪoɪ, 204, 295.