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Evil customs (Catalan: mals usos, lit. "bad uses") were specific medieval feudal customs, generally levies, which peasants were subjected to by their feudal lords in the Crown of Aragon and other European countries. These obligations are related to the Ius Maletractandi, a right approved by the Catalan Court of 1358, which empowered the feudal lords to treat their people in ways later considered unjust. [1]
In the Principality of Catalonia, the population was controlled by the feudal nobility and a number of benefits were established that would later be considered evil customs. The customs were most often found in relation to the land of the so-called Old Catalonia. The ties of the peasant to the land he worked required him to pay a redemption if he wanted to leave it. [2]
The Usages of Barcelona collected only three of the most common obligations: the intestia, cugucia and eixorquia. The evil customs with the possibility of being redeemed paying a tribute to the lord in the Sentencia Arbitral de Guadalupe were:
In addition to these evil customs, other manorial customs existed, including:
Another custom that did not only oppress peasants but also humiliated them was the provision of arbitrary labor services. These included the use of a nursing woman to become a wet nurse for the lord's children. [10]
In the Crown of Castile, it is difficult to determine what the evil customs were, since the region was more subject to the oral tradition. Reference is made to the so-called bad fueros, feudal regimes harder in benefits. As Castile tried to attract people from other areas or kingdoms, the fueros or laws were rarely harsh. The evil customs were sporadic or were simply monetary payments. Some examples include:
The abolition of the evil or bad customs took a long time and this could primarily be attributed to the way that it formed part of the identity of the serfs, serving as an essential element in the definition of their servile bond and legal status as subordinate to the lords. [12] Before the series of peasant revolts that stemmed from the ius malectrandi, there were already attempts on the part of the royal courts to eliminate this system of servitude. For instance, Maria de Luna, queen of Aragon-Catalonia began raising the issue some time in the fifteenth century. She appealed to Pope Benedict XIII, her kinsman, citing the example of Christ (ad exemplum Crucifixi) who freed people from their bondage. [13] King John I was also against the system and planned to procure its abolition shortly before his death in 1395.
The evil customs became one of the causes of the Catalan Civil War, which took place between the years 1460 and 1486, the year in which they were abolished by king Ferdinand II of Aragon. He issued the Sentencia Arbitral de Guadalupe, which scrapped the evil customs with a previous payment of 60 salaries per farm, and abolished the right to mistreat and many other minor landed abuses. [14] The peasants maintained the useful domain of the farms, but they had to pay homage to the feudal lord and pay the feudal rights. [15]
The recorded history of the lands of what today is known as Catalonia begins with the development of the Iberian peoples while several Greek colonies were established on the coast before the Roman conquest. It was the first area of Hispania conquered by the Romans. It then came under Visigothic rule after the collapse of the western part of the Roman Empire. In 718, the area was occupied by the Umayyad Caliphate and became a part of Muslim ruled al-Andalus. The Frankish Empire conquered northern half of the area from the Muslims, ending with the conquest of Barcelona in 801, as part of the creation of a larger buffer zone of Christian counties against Islamic rule historiographically known as the Marca Hispanica. In the 10th century the County of Barcelona became progressively independent from Frankish rule.
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