146
THE MESTA
with the reciprocity conventions of the mountain people. The
latter promptly asserted the ‘ ancient highland liberties,’ and
drew up a new federation, the passerie du plan d’Arrem of 15τ3,
which successfully bade defiance to any national interference
with local fiscal agreements. This episode is an instance of the
difficulties encountered by the migrating flocks when their routes
lay across tariff boundaries. We shall later have occasion to
examine the troubles of the Mesta in the fifteenth century and
after, when its members took their flocks into Aragon, Navarre,
and Portugal. The more fortunate situation of the Castilian
organization as a powerful ally of royalty enabled it to circumvent
any national customs barriers. In this respect the Mesta was
even more effective than was the loosely organized pastoral in-
dustry of the Pyrenees in its conflict with the kings of France.
In spite of national restrictions, these mountain communities
continued to observe certain mutual obligations in the form of
payments for the use of each other’s pastures. These dues tended,
of course, to become fixed customary payments, which had been
more or less standardized by various inter-valley treaties of the
period from 1314 to 1390? An interesting present day survival
of these ancient dues is found in the tribute still paid by the herds-
men of Béarn who migrate each year into Navarre. Their stay is
limited by agreement to twenty-eight days, beginning on a speci-
fied date, during which time they enjoy certain pasturage and
water rights upon payment of an annual tribute of three two-
year-old heifers.
The fiscal history of the migratory pastoral industry of Aragon
presents illustrations of both phases of this subject, namely
taxation by local as well as by royal authorities. The antagonism
between the agrarian and the pastoral interests was made more
acute in that kingdom by the strong organization of the contend-
ing parties : on the one hand, the comunidades or leagues of the
towns in the pasturage districts, and on the other, the royally
1 Cavaillès, op. cit., pp. 12-24. The extent of the migrations of French sheep
into Spain is shown by the provisions of the Ordenanzas de la Comunidad de Daroca
(Saragossa, 1741),pp. 26-27, which date back to 127o, ɪ,ʒɜð, and 1441-45, and regu-
lated the movements of “ French, Gascon, Basque, and foreign ” herdsmen, who
came down the Ebro valley and wintered in southern Aragon.
SHEEP TAXES IN THE MEDITERRANEAN REGION 147
indorsed Casa de Ganaderos. or ‘ house of the stock owners ’ of
Saragossa. Because of this feature, it is more difficult to isolate
the original taxes, namely the strictly local fines and penalties
collected from the wandering flocks. That there were such local
dues, and that they not only preceded but far outweighed in
importance the royal ones, cannot be doubted. It is true that the
strong kingship of certain Aragonese sovereigns asserted itself in
the creation of royal taxes upon the flocks, as will be shown later;
but it is none the less true that the predominant feature of pas-
toral taxation in that kingdom was the assessment of ancient tolls
by the towns and private landowners.
Convincing evidence of the prevalence of these local taxes is to
be found in the restrictions imposed by various royal charters
upon the collection of such exactions. For example, the crown
guaranteed to certain groups of migrating sheep owners, notably
those of Saragossa, a free passageway throughout the realm, un-
hampered by any local dues. The earliest of these privileges, that
of г 129, declared that the flocks of Saragossa were not to pay any
of the fees usually levied upon passing sheep;1 especially were
they exempt from the Iezda or -portazgo, a tax assessed by the
towns upon goods carried by the migrants to the local markets
for sale.2 This exemption of the flocks of Saragossa in the shape of
local taxes was renewed and enlarged by the later royal charters
of the Casa, notably by those of 1208,1229,1300,1339, 1440, and
1494.s By these documents the migrants of Saragossa were as-
l A petition from the Casa de Ganaderos to the viceroy of Aragon, 1607 (12 pp.,
1672, n. t. p.), beginning “ Excellentissimo domino Iocumtenienti . . gives
the texts of this document of rι29, and other charters, now in the archives of the
Casa in Saragossa.
2 Ibid. : “ Quod non donetis Iezdas tota mea terra, nisi ad illos portus sicut iaɪn
ante fuit praesum et taliatum inter me et vos per tali conditione. . . .” Other
local taxes were similarly mentioned. Yanguas, Dice. Anl. Nav., ii, pp. 200-201,
gives details on the Iezda in Navarre. See below, p. 158, n. 3. Cf. Lopez de Ayala,
Impuestos en Lebn y Castilla (Madrid, 1896), p. 651. The Ordinaciones de la Ciudad
de CaragoQa of 1122 (ed. Manuel Mora y Gaud6, Saragossa, 1908), i, p. 283, cite
a similar exemption from payment of the Iezda granted to the Mozarabs of the city.
3 The texts of these are found in Arch. Casa Ganaderos, Saragossa, leg. privilé-
gies, nos. 3, 4, and 5; leg. Ms. v, no. ɪ; leg. Ms. x, no. 45; Bib. Nac. Madrid, Ms.
8702, fols. 33-36; Ordinaciones de la Casa y Cofadria de Ganaderos de ÇaragoQa
(eds. of 1640 and 1661). By these charters certain town taxes levied at Epila,