[96] When the knell announced a death at Salamanca, the parish bell tolled twice for a woman, three times for a man. ⁽¹⁾ The early Hispanic Church frowned on despondent mourning but, from Visigothic times into the thirteenth century, medieval Spaniards bemoaned death despairingly with doleful laments, public weeping and other open expressions of profound sorrow, not only by a widow as the chief mourner of her husband but also by others unrelated to the deceased. It was the custom for women especially to scratch their cheeks when they grieved, a practice described by Isidore who regarded the blood as evidence of the soul's anguish and associated its colour with the purple clothing and flowers used at burials in his day. ⁽²⁾ Women are reported to have torn their faces and clothing when they lamented the death of Alfonso I of Aragón in 1134. At the general mourning in 1211 for Alfonso VIII's son and heir, the Infante Fernando, virgins clawed their cheeks, while great men covered their heads with ashes and put on sackcloth and hairshirts to show their desolation. ⁽³⁾ Public grieving was by no means reserved for kings and princes, and whole communities, especially the women of a town, must have mourned collectively when municipal soldiers sustained heavy losses in battle. By the thirteenth century towns were curtailing displays of both extreme grief and mortuary extravagance. At Zamora only widows, widowers, children and servants of the deceased could scratch their cheeks and dress in mourning garb. Soria permitted only a widow to wear sackcloth and tear her face over the grave of a man. Other women were not supposed to claw themselves, but they could weep and moan to share the widow's pain, provided they refrained from sobbing publicly through the streets. Here any number of persons could sit up with the dead, but wine was forbidden to all except clerics attending the wake. Men of the cloth presumably had sense enough not to over-imbibe and degrade what town authorities insisted should [97] be a solemn and sober occasion. Alba de Tormes limited the richness of coverings and cushions for the funeral bed in which a body was laid out. At the Cortes of Valladolid in 1258 the king banned ostentatious finery at funerals, while restricting it at weddings, and designated white, black and grey as appropriate colours for members of a funeral cortege. Municipal funerals, like weddings, were community occasions and provided opportunity for town residents with a taste for luxury to display fancy apparel. Henceforth no one was to wear mourning clothes except social equals of the deceased, his personal servant and his widow. A knight ought neither weep nor scratch his face except at the death of his own lord, but these conventions were not forbidden to widows, indeed, they were expected of them. Medieval mourners, especially widows, did not languish in stoic agony but vented their grief openly with noisy laments and even self mutilation. ⁽⁴⁾

Once the funeral was over and her husband buried, a woman had three choices: religious vocation as a nun, remarriage, or widowhood. Many churchmen traditionally favoured the first two, leaving the decision to the woman herself. Isidore, for example, had mixed views about widows and their future. He defined them as formerly married women who neither remarried nor consorted with men, a definition which enjoyed wide approval in later medieval times. Widows, in his opinion, were on the whole excessively lazy, garrulous and interfering busybodies since they had no husbands to keep them occupied and out of mischief. Their unbridled concupiscence also disturbed the Sevillan archbishop who regarded it as the main cause of recreancy among those who had taken vows. They ought to emulate Naomi, the Shunamite woman who cared for Elisha, the valiant Judith, Tabitha whom Peter raised from the dead, and especially the Virgin's mother Anne, presumably because these women exemplified qualities Isidore found lacking in most widows: loyalty, compassion, courage, purity and maternal dedication. A new husband but, far more, religious vows that were kept would certainly serve to foster such virtues and rectify the moral deficiencies which Isidore attributed to the widows of seventh-century Baetica. ⁽⁵⁾ To be sure, his judgments may have derived from writers he was following, Tertullian for instance, or late Roman misogynists. Widows nevertheless presented certain problems for churchmen desirous of promoting the ideals of both chastity and Christian marriage, for the widow as neither virgin nor wife could provoke distrust and anxiety.

[98] There can be little doubt that Reconquest towns favoured remarriage for a widow. Unlike a daughter, she was free to marry whom she pleased and at reduced expense for the groom. The municipal restrictions on her remarriage were never flat prohibitions nor discouraging penalties but punitive fines when she wed before the expected year of mourning had expired. Implied here was concern for the paternity of a posthumous child but also the need for propriety and respect for her first husband. The waiting requirement accorded with limits on expenditures for her wedding and bans on a bridal procession, precautions aimed at discouraging an altogether unseemly encore. A woman's emergence from widowhood was not reprehensible unless she failed to observe decorum and good taste.

The religious life, both as a sanctuary and opportunity to develop talents beyond the scope of hearth and home, may have been attractive to municipal widows. Unfortunately we know too little about monasteries for women and other communities of female religious in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries to assess this particular future for widows. The great Benedictine and Cistercian abbeys, especially in the north, drew women from the wealthy and aristocratic classes. ⁽⁶⁾ Ordinary townswomen would have found the mendicant orders more suitable to their situation, but the spread of such foundations for women awaits thorough study. Many types of religious community developed slowly in the new towns of Castile since hospitals, founded by the military and the redemptive orders for returned captives and the wounded, often received priority over other types of eleemosynary corporation in Reconquest communities. ⁽⁷⁾ Widows conceivably found nursing vocations in hospitals, but of this we have no evidence. Secular records are on the whole uninformative about consecrated virgins and widowed nuns. Certainly celibacy posed hazards to essential settlement policies. Towns discouraged citizens of either sex from taking significant property, especially real estate, into the religious orders they joined. Municipalities set limits of a fifth, sometimes half, on a recruit's movable goods and usually prohibited any donations of land. These emphatic restrictions were often explained by the need to protect the inheritance rights of children in particular but also the claims of other relatives, and they must have discouraged citizens from entering religious houses which expected substantial gifts from new members. ⁽⁸⁾ The reasons given for limiting donations suggest that the religious life was more appealing to widowed parents than to the young, but there is no sign that [99] municipal widows scurried into convents, nor that they were encouraged to disappear into the monastic life.

The widows of a town were women to be reckoned with from many different perspectives, not simply as formerly married women who had yet to remarry or enter convents. There must have been many of them in Reconquest communities, although we do not have sufficient evidence to weigh numbers of war widows against the widowers left by the high death rate of medieval women in childbirth. ⁽⁹⁾ The actual circumstances of a widow could vary enormously. She might be old, poor and feeble and thus merit special consideration. The medieval Church sought from its earliest days to shelter widows from hardships of the single life and classed them, together with orphans, invalids and the poor, as persons deserving pity (miserabiles personae). Widows were often named among the non-combatants shielded by the episcopal or papal peace, and the fuero of Jaca in Aragon prominently incorporated the ecclesiastical peace objective, explicitly designating widows as persons protected from military violence. ⁽¹⁰⁾ Leonese and Castilian towns frequently defended and championed widows, not necessarily against violence but on account of poverty, their formerly married status and for other reasons. The municipal widow, however, was not invariably a charity case. She might be young, well-to-do and energetic. No longer obliged formally to observe the diverse constraints marriage imposed on a wife, she could find herself at the head of a substantial household with the autonomy and also the responsibilities that position entailed. The municipal widow was at once a single woman, perhaps a mother, stepmother or in-law, and normally a resident of the town where she had lived with her husband. We can perceive how widowhood affected a woman's position in society by examining her sources of security and independence, the diverse family connections that bore on her interests, and her duties and privileges as an adult female resident of her town.

The basis of a municipal widow's economic security was the particular marriage regime followed in the town where she resided with her husband. Every such plan functioned as a means of providing for the widowhood of either spouse. Marriage was characterized by a society of acquisitions to which both contributed capital and from which each claimed varying proportions of profits and debt. These matrimonial regimes operated during marriage, but they became fully effective only at its dissolution, usually by the death [100] of one spouse. Under the society of acquisitions in its diverse forms a widow possessed property of her own: endowment from her husband, trousseau and perhaps inheritance from her parents, and everything else she owned before she married, plus whatever part of acquired property and debts the customs of her town allowed her. Where endowment constituted an economically significant feature of betrothal and marriage, it was designated to support a man's widow and children. Since the arras of municipal custom were frequently a limited bridal expense for the groom, rather than a commitment of wealth to provide for his widow, arras were not invariably a substantial source of support. A widow would have to depend essentially upon her own resources since the bilateral principle governing inheritance gave her late husband's property to their children or his other heirs. The wife's half of a couple's acquisitions was most vitally important when the couple or only the wife had come to settle in a new town. Wherever they lived, these would consist characteristically of a patchwork of claims to parts of fields, buildings, herds, crops and items the couple had gathered over the years of marriage.

The society of acquisitions was an exceedingly fair way to divide the benefits of the marriage partnership, but a widow could see the gains she and her husband had made dwindle rapidly, especially if the couple was heavily in debt when he died. At towns with customs of the Cuenca type, where the interests of creditors were assiduously protected, all debts, together with burial expenses and committed alms, were due immediately after a husband or wife died. ⁽¹¹⁾ To be sure, many communities divided the conjugal debt in half and considered gambling debts, pre-marital borrowing and certain other personal commitments of a husband obligations only of his heirs who would take responsibility for them after partition. Until the end of the thirteenth century a child could not legally refuse an inheritance in order to avoid paying a dead parent's debts when they exceeded assumable assets. ⁽¹²⁾ But where all debts could be collected immediately from the conjugal property as a whole, rather than separately from the survivor and other heirs, a widow was at a severe disadvantage. It was then impossible to defer her share of whatever she and her husband owed, and payments could eat up their acquisitions, property she may have counted on to support her in widowhood.

Whether or not a widow retained substantial real property and [101] other goods from the society of acquisitions, the timing of formal partition was crucial to her prosperity. In principle it took place soon after her husband died, but this did not invariably happen, and it could be delayed owing to the age of her children, the wishes of her husband's heirs, their absence from town and other factors. ⁽¹³⁾ Certainly the longer partition was postponed the better off a widow would be. At twelfth-century Daroca, for example, it was legally deferred until both a mother and father had died, a fairly exceptional case in which the claims of a couple's heirs, in this case their children, were put off permanently until both parents were dead. ⁽¹⁴⁾ It became far more common to permit partition long before then, often at the request of any heir, since a husband and wife were not one another's heirs, and it was frequently necessary to consider the legitimate claims of persons other than a couple's sons and daughters, stepchildren for instance. Any means for delaying partition, whether legally or illegally, benefitted widowed spouses, and there were circumstances under which widows obtained reprieves from the customary demand to divide marriage property immediately after their husbands died.

One possible means whereby partition could be postponed was a compact made by a husband and his wife during their marriage to leave the survivor a jointure. This consisted of usufructory or, less common, proprietary rights in property owned by the spouse who died first. It took the form of a mutually beneficial agreement and, if not written down, the spouses were obliged, partly for their own protection, to announce it at their parish church at weekend services or at a regular meeting of the town assembly, often held on Sundays. At Alcalá de Henares, Cuenca and other towns it had to be confirmed by relatives who would benefit from partition. Although the sources are somewhat imprecise about the property included under such compacts, the one called hermandad, undade or unitas seems to postpone partition entirely until the survivor's death, thus giving a widow or widower use for life of all the land and movables, whether acquisitions or ancestral property, belonging to the deceased spouse. ⁽¹⁵⁾ A more unusual arrangement, styled meetade or medietas, was evidently permitted only when neither spouse had children, but it seems to transfer full ownership of all movables and real property which heirs would otherwise receive from the spouse who died first. ⁽¹⁶⁾ It is not impossible that diverse methods for preserving parts of matrimonial assets to benefit survivors characterized such agreements, but the requirements for publicity and consent, not to mention the willingness [102] of her husband to execute one of them, meant that a widow could not count on an automatic free bench. We do not know the frequency of these compacts, but many towns permitted them at the request of wives and husbands who, although uncertain when they made them which one would survive, would probably know which spouse was in greater need of the agreement's protections. Couples were evidently planning for one another's future in widowhood when other relatives might be expected to assert their interests against those of a vulnerable widow or, indeed, widower since a husband was not invariably as rich, and perhaps not even as influential in their town, as his wife.

A more dependable guarantee for a widow would be a will of the Roman type in which she was instituted heir of her husband's estate. Unrestricted, especially interconjugal, testation came slowly to Castile owing to the strong claims of customary heirs, and it was not fully legal until the end of the thirteenth century. By the twelfth century a person's freely disposable fifth of property, as allowed under Visigothic law and later the Fuero Real, had become primarily a means for benefiting the soul by bequest (testamentum, lengua, manda). A number of towns permitted larger such bequests but took a fifth of movables, frequently livestock, for the parish clergy when an individual died intestate. ⁽¹⁷⁾ To die intestate meant to die without providing for one's soul by giving money for masses but also alms to churches, monasteries, hospitals, the poor, the redemption of captives and other charitable causes. Several communities admitted additional bequests to acquaintances but hinged the option on the vague condition that children and grandchildren should not be deprived of support. This was possible, for example, at Avilés, Oviedo, Salamanca and Ledesma. At the latter two towns bequests could be made out of 'good love' (por buen amor) to friends and relatives, spouses included. Early in the thirteenth century Castroverde, also in León, explicitly permitted unlimited gifts by will to wife or husband, but this was exceptional since many towns, especially in Castile, looked out first for a person's heirs, whether they were children or other relatives. ⁽¹⁸⁾ Thus, while Coria and other towns in Extremadura permitted a bequest of half of one's movables to a spouse, Brihuega allowed only a fifth. At Alcalá de Henares a gift (una dona) of movables could be left to wife or husband, as was also the custom at Sepúlveda which specifically forbade a person to sell ancestral property for the purpose. ⁽¹⁹⁾ At Cuenca and other towns any [103] bequest to a spouse, like a compact preserving a life interest, had to be confirmed by and in the presence of prospective heirs, and it was emphasized that the gift was invalid without their approval.⁽²⁰⁾ At one town in Old Castile, unidentified in a regional compilation of customs, spouses were allowed to leave one another a gift (un dadio)consisting of one house out of several, but children got first choice, and the survivor could not take the best house although the couple had lived there, especially if it were a fine one with upstairs rooms and facing the main road. Wife or husband could receive a mill, if there were more than one, and a piece of land provided others remained. Permitted also were gifts of grain, wine, money and all manner of things necessary for running the house. There might be fields and vineyards attached, as well as beehives, casks, chests, jars, cooking equipment, tack, arms and other goods. All this could be left to a widowed spouse, but only when there was additional and at least equally desirable property for children. ⁽²¹⁾ Most towns were less indulgent. Municipal marriage, however desirable, was not an avenue to easy riches, especially at the expense of children and other members of municipal families for whom any gifts across the bond of matrimony represented a lesion of their interests. Custom therefore resisted and restricted the means by which spouses could benefit one another. As survivor, then, the widow was uncertain to succeed to the management, not to speak of outright ownership, of a couple's joint assets, and partition with her late husband's heirs invariably left her less well situated and sometimes poorly maintained.

Many towns provided for a widow's minimum needs by setting aside from a couple's property basic necessities for her use. These items, which she would otherwise have to share with the heirs, were a widow's perquisites. Gender-linked goods appropriate to men were also reserved for widowers from a couple's jointly owned acquisitions, most importantly military mounts, arms, tents and sometimes hunting birds; but towns were especially careful to meet a widow's fundamental requirements for food, shelter, clothing and transportation, and to give her other things a woman needed or claimed as personal effects.

Owing to the way in which marriage property was divided, a widow did not invariably hold on to the residence she and her husband had shared. If she did not own the house herself, it was far more likely that she would preserve only part interest in it, as did children or her husband's other heirs. Some communities listed a [104] house among a widow's perquisites, but it was rarely left fully furnished nor was it necessarily the one she had lived in while married. She did not invariably secure a house at all since the couple might possess only one dwelling, and this was far too important a property to withhold solely for a widow's benefit, even if she had helped to pay for it. ⁽²²⁾ The most prominent item supplied a widow, and usually a widower, was the marriage bed. It was the pivot of the conjugal family, married life and the survivor's status as a widowed spouse, and it could come decked lavishly with mattress, pillows, sheets, spreads, hangings and feather ticks, all highly valuable belongings in themselves. ⁽²³⁾ For getting around, many meseta towns furnished a widow with a mule or mulish beast which, unlike the horse, was traditionally a woman's means of transportation. Aristocratic ladies took both a riding mule and a pack animal, but the municipal widow's animal came saddled and bridled for riding, or it was an ass equipped for hauling things. At Alba de Tormes a mule and her clothes were the only items a widow preserved from jointly owned property. ⁽²⁴⁾

Clothes were highly prized possessions, and several towns set aside apparel for widows from jointly owned property, less frequently for widowers. ⁽²⁵⁾ At Soria, for example, a widow could retain her entire wardrobe together with any of her late husband's wedding gifts presented as arras which frequently included new garments for municipal brides. At Soria, however, a widow was not to keep her jewels unless she or her family had paid for them. These jewels turn up as perquisites of a widow in the northeast, in lower Navarre and at Jaca. A townswoman's 'jewels', however hypothetical, were personal trinkets of value that other women of a family would surely want included among its divisible goods. ⁽²⁶⁾ Any swanky attire was a status symbol, could arouse envy and have to be shared. Customs in lower Navarre allowed a widow a limited number of coifs (tocas), two for daily wear and a fancy one for Sunday. She could also hold back two sheepskin cloaks, one for everyday and a better one for Sunday. Even the widow of a Castilian noble was granted no more than three changes of dress from a couple's acquisitions.⁽²⁷⁾ Unless a townswoman's clothes were bought before she married, were betrothal or wedding gifts from her husband, or explicitly bestowed as perquisites, the widow would have to negotiate to keep them all since they were otherwise conjugal property rather than hers alone.

The value of the things a widow could preserve differed widely [105] from town to town, and some communities were more generous than others. At Cuenca, for example, she did not get a house, mule or clothes but could keep, in addition to the bed, a subsistence-holding which included a small sown field, a pair of oxen and a vineyard, although not an enclosed one. Coria was much more liberal. Here she took the bed, now well and warmly furnished, but also a small house, her choice among fields and vineyards, and milling rights every two weeks. She secured plough animals, also a mule or ass, twelve sheep and a sow, plus one Muslim slave (male or female), a cooking cauldron and all her clothes. At Salamanca a widow was similarly well provided for. She obtained house and bed complete with elaborate linens, covers and trimmings, also a table, benches and chests. She took a field, vineyard and oxen besides an ass and a turn at a mill. For housekeeping she was allowed cauldrons, spits, a fire shovel, sieves, sifters, and scales, and she kept a large wine barrel, cutlery, crocks, trenchers, cups and spoons. All these remained in a widow's house when they were jointly owned goods of wife and husband. If they all belonged solely to him, she was entitled to no more than half. ⁽²⁸⁾ This was also true at Coria, but at most towns she took nothing that did not form part of acquisitions, and she had no right to items when she owned the same things outright. What she kept as a widow's personal effects had to be available primarily among the goods the couple had accumulated, and other property of her husband was not sold to provide them. But these prerogatives gave a widow without much wealth of her own a head start when it became time to slice up conjugal property. Then she would have to take her chances or bargain with other relatives, perhaps stepdaughters or sisters-in-law, for the things they also needed and wanted and to which they, too, were entitled.

A widow needed time to get on her feet. Perquisites allowed her to established herself as a single woman, or they tided her over until she remarried. To assume and 'keep widowhood' meant to possess these goods, but under certain conditions. Whenever she remarried, or inappropriately made plans to remarry before she was out of mourning, the personal effects of widowhood had to be returned for partition among the family. ⁽²⁹⁾ At several towns taking a lover brought this about and sometimes also the loss of other marriage property held conditionally by either survivor. ⁽³⁰⁾ 'Keeping widowhood' implied a commitment to chastity, as symbolized by a widow's, and usually widower's, retention of the marriage bed, and relatives could take it [106] away for any lapse in the fidelity it represented. Widowed women, however, were more clearly expected to remain chaste than were men as a sign of good behaviour, and several towns required visible signs of a widow's faithfulness, at least until after the important anniversary mass was celebrated. Every Monday at Salamanca and Ledesma she had to present a monetary offering and manchet, an oblation of fine white bread, to the church where her husband was buried. If she failed in this duty, her late husband's relatives could take pledges from her until she complied. At harvest time she had to make gifts, perhaps a tithe, of grain and wine from her widow's holding, while his relatives were expected to give money for masses and wax for candles. At Coria and other towns only the widow had to present offerings: manchet, money and a candle on Sundays and Mondays, and her in-laws collected a fine for any day she missed. ⁽³¹⁾ The weekly offerings, especially the fine white bread, were reminders of the need for virtue. It would have been unwise to overlook these visits since neglect might signify that she was no longer faithfully chaste and still entitled to her widow's property.

Watchful or rapacious in-laws were in some ways warded off by a widow's children, her most precious asset. Aside from ties of affection, children were valuable for labour, income, support in old age and other aid. The more children she had the more commanding her relative position in respect to the property they all owned, at least for as long as they stayed together. Although lineage remained the fundamental nexus of inheritance, the children of a widow, as their father's heirs, blunted the harsh effects of partition in ways that a husband's collateral kin or her stepchildren could not or would not willingly do. The birth of a child cemented a marriage in the eyes of custom, and certain benefits flowed to widowed parents as a result. Children channeled to their widowed mother various benefits that were unavailable to a widow without them. One such advantage, although unfortunate, was a widow's claims to the property of a child who died without descendants of its own. Ascendant succession was widely practiced, and a widowed parent was commonly given preference over siblings as the 'closest relative' and rightful heir to at least part of a childless child's inheritance and its other goods. To be counted a legal heir a child usually had to have lived for at least nine days. Then, when one of its parents died and the child thereafter, the surviving parent became eligible to receive certain of its property, including some inherited from the parent who had died first. ⁽³²⁾ At [107] Coria all the property of a deceased child was bestowed on its widowed mother, while at Cáceres, Alcalá de Henares and Soria she inherited its movables and a life interest in its land. Soria judged that any livestock, plate or cloak of scarlet cloth inherited by the child were too valuable to be lumped with other movables, and she could keep these like real estate only for life. ⁽³³⁾ At Salamanca and Ledesma she was given all a dead child's property to use until she died, while at Cuenca she got ownership of its movables, a life interest in acquired land but no ancestral property from the father's side. ⁽³⁴⁾ Sepúlveda gave her the movable goods, but Plasencia considered any of a child's acquired property to be movables, and all these, although not inherited land, went to its widowed mother. ⁽³⁵⁾ At Alcalá de Henares, Teruel and Sepúlveda her claims depended upon family property arrangements at the time the child died. If the couple's other children had divided the conjugal assets with their mother but not among themselves, the co-cultivating siblings rather than the widow took the goods allowed. ⁽³⁶⁾ These, then, were a few of the diverse possibilities by which a widow's assets could increase through inheritance from a deceased child. Rarely did she receive ancestral real estate from the father's side, and then usually under the conditions of a life interest only. Any gift for life always carried precautionary requirements that she maintain and keep it in good condition pending its redistribution among the couple's other children or relatives, the eventual claimants after she died. Ascendant succession undoubtedly suited the needs of a society in which the rate of infant mortality was high, and it gave a widowed mother a certain precedence over all those other heirs. It also staked out her claims against the spouse of a child who died without children. An older widow pushed aside the childless widow of her son.

These rights and conditions of ascendant succession were fundamentally the same for mothers and fathers at each town, but custom was notably attentive to the hereditary rights of the posthumous child, particularly an only child whose birth could upset any number of hopes and ambitions among the dead father's family. It was entitled to paternal inheritance from which its mother obtained support until she delivered. If she outlived the child, she was eligible to claim some of its property like any other widowed mother. Some communities reserved the rights exclusively to widows. ⁽³⁷⁾ At Cuenca and other towns these mother's benefits were also available to a barragana, a bachelor's domiciled mistress. Pregnant wife or barragana lived out of [108] the man's property, holding it on behalf of her unborn child. If it survived for nine days and later died, the father's land had to be returned to his family, but the mother could keep all his movable goods. Widows and widowed barraganas were certainly not unaware of these advantages since towns anticipated the possibility of a conveniently false pregnancy and required a woman who, it later turned out, had made an untrue declaration to return double whatever she had spent before her deception came to light. ⁽³⁸⁾

These diverse rights of ascendant succession did not necessarily compensate a woman for the loss of her child. In material terms alone she was better off if it survived. Just as brothers and sisters often chose not to divide an inheritance but kept it together in one piece for their mutual benefit so, too, a mother and one or more of her children, especially her unmarried children, might share a house and property in which all had an interest. Siblings who stayed together divided work, expenses, taxes and other household responsibilities, an arrangement that was equally beneficial to widowed parents and their children. The latter, as adults, were allowed maximum choice in the matter of partition, but their widowed mother, especially a wealthy one, could make a good partner in cultivating a family property, managing a herd, or running a workshop in which mother and child both had an investment and some experience. Whether or not they joined efforts instead of dividing depended upon many variables including the age of the children, their wishes as adults, and the influence of other family members interested in both the children and the property the latter inherited from their father. Infants and minor children might be expected to stay with a widow after he died, but many towns recognized, after the middle of the twelfth century, systems of familial tutelage or wardship which allowed someone other than a widowed parent to be tutor and guardian, thus leading to separation of widow and child before it became an adult. The age of maturity was fifteen at many Leonese towns, as under Visigothic law, but in Castile it was as low as twelve for both sexes. At Brihuega and Fuentes de la Alcarria boys were emancipated from tutelage at fourteen, girls at twelve, while at Ledesma a boy came into his patrimony at fifteen, a girl only when she married. At many towns the end of tutelage meant, in principle, that young people of both sexes could do as they pleased with their inheritance and live where or with whomever they wished. ⁽³⁹⁾ A daughter continued under the obligation to be wed by her widowed parent and the other relatives charged with [109] consenting to her marriage, but tutelage gave these in-laws an early opportunity to meddle in the affairs of a widow and her children.

Tutelage of an orphan, meaning a minor whose father or mother was dead, usually comprehended both care of the child and stewardship of its patrimony. The objective was nurture and personal care but also, and often primarily, safeguarding the child's economic interests so that, when the child came of age, the inheritance could then be transmitted intact, if indeed not in a more prosperous state. Preference as tutor and guardian went first to a widowed mother or father, a legal tradition since Visigothic times, but a parent could be displaced by a relative or, among the aristocracy, an outsider who would better serve the child's property interests. Although many towns attended most carefully to the practical responsibilities of the widow or the person who acted as tutor, some communities were concerned that she supply discipline, moral guidance and other less tangible evidence of her suitability for rearing the young.

At Zamora and, in most instances, at Salamanca and Ledesma a widowed parent took over administration of a minor's inheritance for their mutual benefit, and a widow would disburse the paternal property when the child came of age. Shortly we shall note some exceptional circumstances at the latter two towns, but here the widowed mother of a young child, although not just any widow, could usually expect to retain substantial control over and benefit from the matrimonial assets, at least for a time. ⁽⁴⁰⁾ At Zamora kinsmen could intervene to forestall fraud or gross incompetence on the widow's part, but also to assist her by preventing a child prone to disobedience, gambling or other vice from getting hold of the inheritance. Under Leonese royal law parents, notably fathers, had heavy responsibilities to bring delinquent children to justice and pay their fines and damages, especially bastards who became hooligans. Unlawful acts or any legal matters affecting a minor's property were responsibilities of a guardian, but there was also the need to set a good example for the child. ⁽⁴¹⁾ Thus at Salamanca a relative would replace mother or father for improper conduct, perhaps for gambling or vice but in the case of a widow most likely for unchastity, hasty remarriage or failure to attend to her husband's grave. Once she mended her ways, the children and their property were returned to her supervision. ⁽⁴²⁾ A good reputation was expected of a guardian at Cuenca while at Soria discretion was a necessary virtue. In lower Navarre permitting children to roam unattended in and out of the house [110] without proper food or clothing was listed among a widow's transgressions. ⁽⁴³⁾ At most Leonese and Castilian towns, however, good behaviour was not the primary consideration in determining whether a widow was fit to retain guardianship of her child. Practical matters received greater attention and, therefore, a widowed mother might easily lose the child, together with its inheritance, to someone else. This could happen under either of two procedures.

At Cuenca and other towns a minor's inheritance was inventoried in a document, and the widow as guardian had to rear the child, administer the inheritance, make an annual accounting to its paternal relatives, and demonstrate her ability not to waste or mismanage but indeed to increase the value of the property. ⁽⁴⁴⁾ If negligent, one of those relatives took both child and property under the same conditions, but at the outset the widow was preferred. Much depended upon her performance as a manager of property if she wished to raise her child even under the supervision of her in-laws. She would be relieved of her duties for maladministration, including failure to increase the assets, as would any relative who succeeded her as guardian. She could be replaced for fraud as well as incompetence, but then also fined. Since incompetence included failure to add value to the inheritance, rather than simply maintain it, and the performance of the mother and any subsequent guardians was evaluated once a year, it was possible for a child to shuttle among relatives even annually. Loss of the management office meant loss of custody, although not necessarily of income since no child-care expenses were deducted, and all the proceeds had to be paid into the child's estate. ⁽⁴⁵⁾

It was the custom at many towns to put a child's inheritance up for auction (en almoneda) every year, with the duties and rights of tutelage given to the relative who promised the highest annual return on mills, vineyards, livestock or any other property a minor inherited. 'All things being equal' (tanto por tanto), a widowed parent was preferred as guardian, but an uncle, grandparent or other relative who pledged a larger annual sum would be given the guardianship instead. ⁽⁴⁶⁾ Occasionally, as at Brihuega and Soria, the minor's property might be managed by a delegated administrator other than the widow or whichever relative had custody, but usually both child care and entrepreneurial duties went to the family member who promised the highest payment to the child's estate. Town officials sometimes checked on those managers, but the widow as guardian and administrator had to answer primarily to her child's paternal kin. ⁽⁴⁷⁾[111] The auction system was widely popular, not only in towns but also among the aristocracy, for here there was the chance of making money by gaining more from the ward's property than the annual dividend agreed to in advance. Moreover, a more prosperous relative from either side of the family could compete and with slight opportunity for fraud, which the procedure followed at Cuenca afforded more easily. All things being equal, a mother was guardian, but she could be displaced by any of the child's relatives who promised a higher payment and wanted its assets and usually the child as well. The mother could, however, also refuse the responsibility, presumably demurring for any number of reasons: inexperience, timidity, pressure from kin, or the hope of a better life for her child at a grandparent's or other relative's house. A woman with many young children to support perhaps welcomed this possibility, but she was far less likely to accede gratefully when she could not keep at least one son and daughter to help her out at home.

At Salamanca and Ledesma, where a widow was expected to become her child's guardian, this bidding for custody of a minor was prescribed when both parents were dead. It was also an option when one of them was still alive. ⁽⁴⁸⁾ The choice of whether or not to become guardian was sometimes given to a widowed mother, but it was essentially up to other relatives to decide if they wanted the widow's child. Offering a higher price entitled a richer relative to supplant her as guardian and tutor. She would not be relieved of the responsibilities if no one else wanted them. More than property was at stake. A youth could later substitute for a man in military service but as a boy assist with agricultural and pastoral labours. A girl contributed importantly to domestic work, but not only at a widow's house. There was a continuing need for manpower in towns, especially for young men, and early weaning could shift a child's loyalties most effectively. The widow's child, especially her son, was wanted by persons other than herself, and tutelage permitted well-established municipal families to compete successfully against widows for a town's most valuable children.

In the north at San Sebastian, as at Estella, a widow administered all matrimonial assets on behalf of her minor children, stepchildren and herself, although she could not sell property of her stepchildren like that of her own offspring. Here she was understandably styled 'lady and most powerful' (domina et potentissima), but this is a somewhat overly exalted title since she lost custody and tutelage at [112] remarriage, a reservation that did not apply to a father. Moreover, a husband could, by will, deprive his widow of her position as guardian. ⁽⁴⁹⁾ Soria, now following the Fuero Real and Visigothic law, also made a widow's remarriage justification for taking minor children from their mother's care, as well as relieving her of administering their property. South of Navarre this hostility toward a Castilian widow's remarriage was a newly fashionable prejudice. At Soria, moreover, none of a remarried woman's relatives were qualified to raise her children, only those on their late father's side. A father could keep his children when he married again, but he was still obliged to pass the test of respectability required of a guardian, promise the best annual return on his child's maternal inheritance, and give it a more comfortable home than his own or his first wife's relatives could provide. A rich and capable maternal grandmother was explicitly allowed to take a child, even against his wishes, and whether or not he remarried. ⁽⁵⁰⁾

It was not difficult to cast a father's second wife into the role of a wicked and scheming stepmother, madrastra, with all the pejorative meaning the sound of the word conveys. As a widow, she could become the focus of dispute among sets of children quarreling over property that belonged to their parents. For practical reasons effective separation of a family's fields, flocks and other assets did not invariably take place after one parent died, nor even before the survivor remarried, although failure to divide then was fundamentally illegal. When the reckoning finally came for the widow of a twice or much married man who had not given his children their maternal goods, it would usually be relatively simple to identify the personal property of a widow's predecessors and bestow it on their respective children, together with a per capita share of the father's property. Acquisitions caused the real difficulties, and at Cuenca and other places acquisitions were assigned in a way which left the father's last wife and widow at a perceptible disadvantage. Here a family's accumulated acquisitions were not shared between widow and children who each received the same amount. They were distributed first to each litter of children by beds, in order of the father's marriages to each mother, with the result that the widow and her children were the last to be considered, and the older stepchildren or just one stepchild took the lion's share of conjugal property. The first wife's child or children got half of all the acquisitions accumulated between the onset of the father's first marriage and the date of [113] partition with their widowed stepmother. Half the remainder went to a child or children of the second wife, then half of the rest to those of the third bed, and so on down the line of man's marriages. Even if the widow was only the second wife and had one stepchild but many children, the stepchild took not only its mother's and a share of its father's personal property but half of all the accumulated land, livestock, household goods and equipment, leaving a dividend of which half belonged to the widow and the rest to all the father's children, including the stepchild who had already claimed much of everything. When a husband and wife both had children from previous marriages, the older ones had the same prerogatives. Those on each side took a quarter of all the acquisitions counted at the time of partition, while the widow and the couple's children kept the remainder, half of which belonged to all the man's children. ⁽⁵¹⁾ A widow, even if she had been the richest wife and wealthier than her husband, could see the acquisitions and profits of their marriage fall mainly to stepchildren, perhaps just one stepchild, with a considerably smaller portion left for herself and her own children, especially a younger one of her latest marriage. In justice to the bilateral principle, a stepfather (padrastro) could be just as pinched, but fathers who married again were apparently more successful than mothers at withstanding their children's demands for partition since the reform of division by beds at fifteenth-century Sepúlveda emphasized its injustice solely to widows. Perhaps many of them simply outlived older husbands. In any event, a wife could now oblige a man to divide with his children, and if he refused, their acquisitions were no longer computed up until the time of partition, when she was a widow, but to the date she formally requested him to give his children their mother's property. ⁽⁵²⁾ A father's failure to divide before remarriage and division by beds could place a widowed stepmother at such a disadvantage that it is not hard to see why earlier custom betrays the need for suspicion toward her. She might understandably try to hold back property that belonged to her stepchildren, and they needed legal remedies for bringing suit to recover what was theirs, ascertain that she was not making them pay too large a share of the conjugal debt, or convict her of lying and trying to cheat them. Blame for problems with a scheming stepmother was fairly laid on the deceased father who, out of ignorance or greed it is said, had not divided with his children before he remarried. ⁽⁵³⁾ Fixing blame did not lessen the adverse effects on the man's widow but, from another [114] perspective, it was certainly desirable to prevent a young adornment of a man's old age from doing children out of their birthrights.

This division by beds was not the custom everywhere. At Coria and Cáceres, for example, a widow's investments in her predecessor's property were protected against seizure by stepchildren, and all a man's children received per capita shares of matrimonial acquisitions. ⁽⁵⁴⁾ Nor was division by beds customary in other parts of León. But in much of Castile a man's second wife, at least one with stepchildren, was in a more fragile position than his first. Such a woman was Doña Milia who married Don Doarte of Burgos in the late twelfth or early thirteenth century. Doarte was a widower with a son, to whom he had failed to give his maternal inheritance. When the son, Joan Donato, asked for it, the father claimed he had already disbursed it, a fact Joan denied. In the midst of subsequent litigation Doarte died, leaving the son in contention with Doña Milia. She lost the case and had to restore to Joan three-quarters of all the acquisitions of the household, as well as three-quarters of everything else in land and movables. Doña Milia, not the son, suffered from the father's lapse in not dividing with Joan after his mother's death. In addition to his parents' property, he obtained acquisitions accumulated during his parents' marriage, his father's widowhood and the second marriage to Doña Milia, including income derived from property she owned. ⁽⁵⁵⁾

All these matters of a family's property and competing claims to it were subjects of great importance to a widow. Her position could vary considerably, but it was fundamentally insecure. Priority of interest in controlling a family's property went to the young, vigorous generation, and a widow was therefore unlikely to emerge as a matriarch unless she was substantially wealthy in her own right, through both a sizeable inheritance and a prosperous marriage. Formal partition and division of a couple's property were bound to cause her discomfort and lower the standard of living to which she had become accustomed as a wife. Moreover, any conjugal assets a widow administered but did not own could erode gradually as her children grew up, married and took control of their paternal inheritance. Whatever a woman's circumstances when she first became a widow, they were unlikely to improve over the years unless she were rich to begin with, highly competent to manage her property and capable of earning her own living, preferably and most advantageously in partnership with cooperative children.

[115] In recognition of a widow's difficulties some communities decreased her fiscal and other obligations as a householder. This became common practice at seignorial settlements and new towns, beginning in the eleventh century, especially in northern Castile. A widow's responsibilities for labour services, census rent, and military taxes were frequently less than those owed by other colonizers and tenants. Thus after 1074 at Palenzuela and several nearby towns in northwest Castile a householder's obligation for agricultural labour, later commuted to a cash payment, was suspended during a woman's first year of widowhood to allow her to adjust to her new circumstances. ⁽⁵⁶⁾ It became far more common to grant widows permanent reductions. This was both compassionate and sensible since her husband's death had drastically reduced the labour force of the settlement unit, and it was highly desirable for a landlord to keep the widows and children of his tenants and townsmen from leaving the communities he founded. Widows' lower fiscal obligations, concerned statements from landlords about their departure and continuing seignorial preoccupation with a widow's remarriage, evident in the huesas fines, are all signs that women did not invariably choose to stay on after their husbands died. ⁽⁵⁷⁾ Usually, as at Lara or Covarrubias, they owed half of what a couple and the majority of other households paid in labour, money, grain, wine, livestock and other produce. ⁽⁵⁸⁾ A widow's reductions covered a wide variety of ordinary fiscal obligations, and they often depended upon her living alone or lacking the means to hire a man to plough or harvest her crops, or another woman to assist her in a productive enterprise like bread baking. ⁽⁵⁹⁾ Occasionally a widower's dues dropped as well, but widowhood did not relieve a woman or man entirely from the need to continue as a productive member of the community. ⁽⁶⁰⁾ Despite the dismemberment by death of the fully staffed conjugal holding, a widow was still expected to make partial customary payments or carry a share of work with her neighbours. At Santa Maria de la Vega, for example, only a widow with possessions worth fifteen mrs. or less had reduced obligations. She was excused from weekwork but still subject to three boonworks a year on the abbey's lands. At Abelgas in León a widow had to show up for mowing and help get in the bishop's hay unless she could afford to pay labourers to do it for her. ⁽⁶¹⁾

A widow's household was also excused from vital military obligations which tenants and town residents had to fulfil. In small towns and seignorial settlements, where a tax was levied for local defence or [116] to make a contribution (fonsadera)towards the king's annual call to distant operations, widows often had to pay only half the taxes due in money or kind, just as for rent.⁽⁶²⁾ They sometimes paid just half or were even excused entirely, but only when they lacked a son capable of doing the farmwork needed to produce these levies. ⁽⁶³⁾ At large municipalities, however, fonsadera was a scutage tax paid by any household which contained a man who was temporarily unavailable to go on manoeuvres with the urban militia. Such service was a townsman's normal duty, whether as a knight or footsoldier, and it fell on a husband, father or any male head of a household. A resident son, nephew or son-in-law, but not a mercenary, could often serve in his place. ⁽⁶⁴⁾ When a widow headed a household where a capable son or male relative lived, he answered the call to arms, or she was liable to pay the tax on his behalf. A municipal householder's obligation for campaign duty, or the fonsadera tax paid instead, fell only on households where a man lived. A municipal widow neither served nor paid the scutage tax except on behalf of an eligible son or relative when he malingered or lacked a legitimate excuse for not appearing at the muster. ⁽⁶⁵⁾

Fiscal reductions and exemptions for the widows of large independent municipalities became quite rare by the end of the twelfth century. Residents of the most privileged towns, not only those on crown lands but other communities founded by powerful religious corporations or secular lords, did not have extensive and onerous seignorial obligations as colonizers. Both women and men found expanding opportunities for earning their livings as tradesmen, artisans, agricultural and household workers and in a diverse array of legitimate and illegitimate businesses. Municipal widows were not always classed among the needy like the hard-working peasant widows who lived outside the most highly privileged townships. Teruel nevertheless preserved the traditional half pecho or hearth tax for a village widow who had no son of fifteen to take his father's place. Here, as at Cuenca and many other towns, full tax exemption was an honorific privilege extended to householders living within the walls and to any fully equipped knight. The hearth tax fell mainly on villagers, but only Teruel and nearby Santa María de Albarracín granted the reduction to a village widow without an able-bodied son. ⁽⁶⁶⁾ At Coria, Cáceres and Usagre such a woman was excused from providing fodder for the horses of certain municipal officials, an ordinary obligation of her neighbours here in Extremadura. ⁽⁶⁷⁾ At [117] Ledesma any widow could go before the town assembly and make a declaration of poverty on the grounds that she had neither son nor son-in-law to work her property. Then she became tax-exempt like all paupers, unmarried women living alone, elderly citizens, and the maimed and insane. Also exempt were farm managers and gardeners who were agricultural specialists employed by the most prosperous town residents. ⁽⁶⁸⁾ Municipal tax and other exemptions sometimes benefitted helpless citizens, but they were more often reserved for a town's most desirable and esteemed residents. Municipal widows did not invariably fit into either category. Greedy relatives, rather than tax collectors, were likely to be the municipal widow's bane. Setting aside perquisites for a widow's basic needs addressed this problem at many towns, but a poor widow could also depend, if necessary, on other benefits that her children were expected to provide, preferably voluntarily.

Children had extensive moral and material obligations towards their elders, and the procedures for making them care for poverty-stricken parents were sometimes harsh. Twelfth-century Daroca, where the town assembly could oblige children to feed and clothe destitute parents, was in the vanguard of this concern. ⁽⁶⁹⁾ In lower Navarre a widow could bring suit against her children to get them to support her or take her in. All of them were expected to contribute to her upkeep, either currently or later by deductions from their shares of any goods the widow left. Those who refused to help were disinherited, but this was largely an empty threat from a needy widow. ⁽⁷⁰⁾ Thus many towns enforced support by public coercion or shaming children, both married and unmarried, into subsidizing their parents as best they could. At Zamora a widow was supposed to count on a living standard equal to that of any child who resided there, and the latter's failure to provide it meant eviction by town authorities and installation of the widow in the ingrate's house for as long as necessary to get promises of filial generosity. ⁽⁷¹⁾ Similarly at Cuenca the assembly had the power to take over the property of any neglectful child and give it to an impoverished parent. Here a widow could expect to be taken in by a more prosperous son or daughter, or she might be cared for by one who still lived at home. The charitable child's oath was sufficient to dispense with brothers' and sisters' apprehensions that the widow's possessions were being misappropriated, but at Burgos and among the Castilian aristocracy it was advisable for the child who acted as the mother's caretaker to [118] inventory her belongings first, a protection against subsequent charges of fraud. ⁽⁷²⁾ At Soria a poor widow could depend upon a stipend provided by children or grandchildren. Their contributions had to continue even after she remarried but, if they were supporting their widowed father, they were not required to go on giving funds to his widow after he died. A widowed stepmother in particular could not impose herself as a burden on family finances.⁽⁷³⁾ A child's prosperity, whether as a result of a self-made fortune, paternal inheritance or affluent marriage, aided poor widows in the towns. Sons and daughters who valued their reputations as compassionate and worthy citizens would provide whatever a widow needed to get along, but their assistance was not invariably given without begrudging it, and dependency must have been a resource of last resort when a woman could no longer support herself.

Towns looked out for their less fortunate citizens, but not all the widows of a town were classed among the deserving poor. Those who headed households and other women who lived alone had needs aside from those that stemmed from economic distress. Frequently they were granted special status when eminent visitors came to town. From time to time municipal residents would have to provide hospitality to visiting royalty, the town's lord (or sometimes lady), or their agents. These prestigious guests usually had to pay for provisioning, especially when they demanded it frequently or a large retinue arrived. ⁽⁷⁴⁾ Thus at late eleventh-century Nájera the town's 'poor little women' who supplied chickens for the visitors' table had to be paid for their birds, just as other town residents expected payment for whatever victuals they provided. ⁽⁷⁵⁾ Billeting strangers, however, was a particularly onerous duty, and the municipal officials or lord's bailiffs charged with arranging overnight accommodations, usually assigned free of charge for a limited stay, sometimes had to respect the privilege of any household to reject unwanted guests. ⁽⁷⁶⁾ At many towns only knights, clerics and widows were exempt from the need to furnish lodgings. ⁽⁷⁷⁾ At others only widows were excused, and some communities banned the visitors from the houses of widows, virgins, female orphans or any woman without a husband, son or another man in the house. ⁽⁷⁸⁾ Irreproachable sexual conduct was expected of a town's widows and other unattached women. For their own protection, however, they were placed off-limits to the likes of high and mighty bailiffs or soldiers who appeared in town ostensibly on the lord's business.

[119] Widows could often count on special assistance in managing their legal affairs. They were active litigants, both as plaintiffs and defendants, in the municipal courts where they pursued matters their husbands had begun, appeared on their own behalf, and represented minor children in tutelage, servants and other residents of their establishments. ⁽⁷⁹⁾ A woman, however, could easily fail to gain familiarity with the law during her years of married life and not know how to proceed when she had to go to court alone. A widow doubtless called on family members when their help was available, but she could quarrel as easily with contentious relatives as with her neighbours. Thus in the late twelfth or early thirteenth century Mari Peres the Furrier joined with Joan Doris, her son-in-law, to sue Mari's children for part of the cost of fence poles that Mari and Joan installed around the house they all shared. The alcaldes of Burgos upheld mother and son-in-law, obliging the children to contribute to the expense, but Joan agreed to sign over his interest in the property to Mari from whom her children would inherit it. ⁽⁸⁰⁾ Fortunately for her, Joan was a forceful advocate of their suit, but at many towns such a woman, like any person lacking experience with the law, was allowed to ask a more knowledgeable citizen for help in presenting a case. ⁽⁸¹⁾ Not infrequently a widow could even look for assistance in court to one of her town's alcaldes who, to avoid conflicts of interest in disputes that his office required him and his colleagues to judge, was usually forsworn for defending any persons except members of his immediate household. At quite a few communities, however, an alcalde had to take the part of widows and orphans, thus providing a widow with the very best advocate one could hope to obtain. ⁽⁸²⁾ At Salamanca and Ledesma the beneficiaries of this help included widows, orphans, unmarried women, and wives whose husbands were sick or away, while Jewish and Muslim citizens picked their own defenders. At Soria a prosperous widow might hire a professional lawyer to present her side of a case when she chose not to speak for herself. A poor widow, nun or orphan was assigned a priest for counsel, a formidable advocate who was not normally permitted to represent lay citizens before the court. Widows attended hearings with their spokesmen, whether appointed defenders or supportive citizens conversant with local law and custom, although Plasencia permitted sick widows, orphans, and infirm men to delegate another local citizen to represent them in absentia when an appeal was carried to the royal court. ⁽⁸³⁾

It seems plain that widows, spinsters, orphans and other variously [120] disadvantaged citizens were a special charge of the courts, and their representation by notably persuasive advocates suggests a pious concern for the 'pitiable' persons of canon law. The beneficiaries, however, were not necessarily indigent. This is revealed by singular judicial procedures observed at Salamanca, Coria and other towns in Extremadura where local rules were modified in important ways to protect female litigants who lacked husbands or other menfolk to defend them. At Salamanca widows and orphans could be arraigned only by a justice. A woman especially was not to be arrested, nor any of her goods distrained, by one of the court's subordinate officers who agreed with another citizen's seemingly valid complaint against her. ⁽⁸⁴⁾ Similarly, at Coria, Cáceres and Usagre these subalterns, who were sworn citizens of each parish or neighbourhood, were forbidden to arrest women or their adversaries. They could only cite both parties for arraignment by notifying them formally of a preliminary hearing before an alcalde. Here two exceptions were allowed, partly for reasons of efficiency. A woman who lived in a village in the alfoz, typically a town resident of relatively low social and economic status, had to answer the summons of the locally placed subordinate. So did any widow, including one from inside the town proper, when her dispute involved no more than a paltry mr. or an animal. The subordinate could arraign other widows or their opponents, but his power of arrest and distraint was suspended when a widow had substantial property at stake on either side of a dispute. ⁽⁸⁵⁾ These details of a local procedure suggest that unmarried women were indeed vulnerable to manipulation by their neighbours, not excluding its exercise through normal legal channels. Widows, perhaps especially the well-to-do, needed all the first-rate legal assistance their relatives, friends and experienced defenders could give them, and many communities, in their avowed preoccupation with fairness and a single standard of justice for all citizens, attempted to meet their requirements.

A prosperous widow living in one of these Extremaduran towns in the early thirteenth century probably owed her fortune to the region's vital and developing livestock industry. Any Leonese or Castilian widow would count sheep, cattle and horses among her major assets, and at Guadalajara it was illegal to take a widow's animal into pledge against a debt. ⁽⁸⁶⁾ From Extremadura especially come notices of widows who owned stock on a large scale and were active members of their towns' ranching enterprises. They were responsible for [121] contributing manpower to the squadrons of mounted guards who escorted citizens' herds, flocks and shepherds into dangerous grazing grounds beyond the alfoz. A widow of Salamanca, as one of the owners, sent any man from her house, preferably her son, nephew or son-in-law, or she substituted one of her neighbours, a vecino who owned property in town. ⁽⁸⁷⁾ At Cáceres and Usagre a widow could hire a knight when she had no son. He had to be approved by the town assembly since the post demanded brave, skilled and cooperative horsemen to supervise and protect the herds and flocks that ranged for several months over the winter within distance of marauding Andalusians in the Guadiana basin. The replacement for a widow's son was privileged by an excuse from pecho for the year in which he worked for her, and she paid him in accordance with the number of head she sent in the expedition. If he lost his horse on the job, she either replaced it or, if she chose, paid him additional salary. ⁽⁸⁸⁾ It was of course cheaper but also preferable to her fellow stockowners that she have a son to take his father's place alongside their neighbours who had to take up this annual range duty. A male child, always important to a widow with any property, was all the more desirable when she owned large numbers of sheep and cattle. Long-range livestock management and its military organization, developing not only at towns in Leonese Extremadura but also farther east in New Castile and La Mancha, meant that women had to depend on men to participate in this key industry of the plains, but they were not for that reason excluded from its profits, whether as daughters, wives or widows.

Many of a community's propertied widows had been married to municipal knights (caballeros villanos) who, when sufficiently well horsed, armed and housed, preferably within the town walls, were excused from pecho, levies for fortifications, and other obligations of town residents who were neither nobles nor clergy. A town's cavalry, moreover, was usually allotted local scutage levies and the largest portion of any booty the militia captured on its expeditions, a highly important source of wealth for a townsman and his wife. Towards the end of the twelfth century, both at royal towns and those founded by other lords, municipal knights began to acquire a noble's privilege of excusing from personal military service and fiscal obligations the household companions who lived at their expense and also their employees, primarily farm managers, shepherds, viticulturalists and other agricultural specialists. The non-noble knights of the urban [122] militia could thus become the patrons of other town residents, their excusados, who were their legal dependents and for whom they exercised a lord's privilege to represent them in public matters and collect fines and damages on their behalf. ⁽⁸⁹⁾ Some of these knights were able to merge gradually into the ranks of noble knights (caballeros fijosdalgo) who sometimes lived within a township's borders and had true hereditary privileges as a lower nobility. 'The caballeros villanos, however, remained a non-hereditary service aristocracy which came to dominate the economies and monopolize the offices at most important communities, posts from which labourers, artisans, and villagers but also clergy and nobles were excluded. The wife of a townsman who was or became a caballero villano, alcalde or other important local personage basked understandably in the reflected light of her husband's importance and, as his widow, would naturally aspire to retain the privileges which military accomplishment and the couple's wealth had made available to him, privileges which made caballeros villanos less and less distinguishable socially from knights who claimed noble descent.

From the early twelfth century a municipal knight's widow at Toledo was 'honoured in the honour of her husband'. When the couple had a son, she kept her husband's horse and arms, and perhaps his property, in anticipation of the day the son would ride and replace his father as a knight in royal service. A son's inheritance of his father's horse and arms tended to make a knight's privileges hereditary through males, but the Toledan widow was 'honoured' whether or not she had a son, meaning that she had a right to her late husband's prerogatives and exemptions. When Fernando III granted fueros to Córdoba, Cartagena, Carmona and other Andalusian towns in the early thirteenth century, extending the privileges of Toledo into the towns of his new conquests, it was clear that a municipal knight's widow retained his honours for as long as she remained a widow. ⁽⁹⁰⁾ Already by 1181 at Palencia such a woman plainly lost her husband's privilege of tax exemption when she married a man who was not himself eligible for it. ⁽⁹¹⁾ The widows of caballeros at other towns undoubtedly commanded or even demanded the respect and prestige that flowed from their late husbands' accomplishments, but a widow's right or pretension to the tangible privileges of the deceased was not official policy at most communities. Her continued exemption from municipal taxes, however, was becoming increasingly vital to her social standing since the need to pay them abruptly cleared the [123] conveniently blurred social differences between caballeros fijosdalgo, exempt by birth, and caballeros villanos, exempt only by personal service. Tax liability was gradually assuming the mark of a social stigma as the fortunes of the municipal knights improved, one that could easily outweigh its economic burden on the widows and daughters of knights. Fernando's grants to his important new conquests confirmed a caballero's immunity to his widow at Andalusian towns, but it was not formally sanctioned throughout Castile until Alfonso X began to extend the prerogatives of his knights after the middle of the thirteenth century.

The king, faced with continuing threats from Granada and Africa, and later from his son Sancho and the nobles of his own kingdom, greatly enhanced the privileges of the municipal knights whom he saw as supporters of the crown. In charters embodying grants of the Fuero Real to Peñafiel, Cuéllar, Atienza, Buitrago, Burgos and other towns in 1256, he expanded the municipal system of excusados, permitting a caballero to excuse from military service and taxation all his household companions with property worth less than 100 mrs., together with his agricultural workers and servants, on condition that he maintain an expensive horse and elaborate arms for the several months of campaigning the king required along the frontiers. A knight's children were allowed to keep all these excusados until they reached sixteen, at which time a son had to assume his father's place in order to claim them. The widow, to whom the king referred by the title of a noblewoman (duenna), was also to retain her husband's tax exemption and his full household of excusados, provided she did not marry a taxable citizen (pechero). ⁽⁹²⁾ Later elaborations of these principles for Escalona, Madrid, Guadalajara and Valladolid changed the age of majority to eighteen, noted that partition between the widow and her children did not affect their separate entitlements, and specified that the total number of employees counted as the knight's excusados was now limited to an essential staff of shepherds, gardeners and other workers, depending upon his holdings. A man's full honours were not retained except by his widow and adult sons who became knights. Other unmarried sons and his unmarried daughters (donzellas) over eighteen kept exemption only for themselves and one farm manager, not the full household of shepherds, stockmen and other valuable servants his widow and the sons who became knights could still excuse. A daughter, like her mother but unlike her brother, lost even her limited rights when she married a pechero, thus [124] identifying her status more closely with that of her mother than her brother whose privileges depended, not on his marriage, but upon his capability in the profession of arms for which training and inheritance were expected to prepare him. ⁽⁹³⁾

By 1264 it was clear that the exemptions were both inadequate to the king's needs and were being abused. Alfonso undertook in the Cortes of Seville to redefine the knights' prerogatives at his Extremaduran towns. Competent sons, nephews and brothers of the knights could not be counted as excusados but had to take up service themselves. Any citizens who claimed illegally to be excusados were immediately returned to the tax rolls. A knight's widow still kept the full household her husband had excused; his adult unmarried daughter and her farm manager were again exempt; and both widow and daughter once more lost their rights when they married pecheros. A widow's benefits, however, were extended to cover those whose husbands had died before the original enactment of 1256, showing how tentative her rights were before the crown secured them. Now, moreover, the widow of a caballero knighted personally by the king, a member of his family, or one of his magnates was declared in possession of 'her five hundred sueldos', referring to the customary incremental bounty to which a noble was entitled as the victim of some public or private wrong. Like her tax exemptions, this was a special honour the widow lost if she married a man who was not qualified for it, that is, neither a noble nor another of the royally dubbed knights who, unlike nobles, could continue with other caballeros to hold the public offices of their town. ⁽⁹⁴⁾ By the end of the thirteenth century, the duenna, donzella and fijadalgo of Sepúlveda were collecting their five hundred sueldos for such offences as the storming of their houses and lascivious approaches from men. Here both a knight's daughter and widow excused, like father and husband, all their employees, specifically any farm manager, tenant farmer, gardener, miller, shepherd, herdsman, swineherd and keepers of their mares and bees. ⁽⁹⁵⁾ Such prerogatives stemmed from the royal privileges aimed directly at providing for the crown's military needs. The royal honours favoured men in the first instance, but they were extended to women of the class the crown was promoting. It remained in essence a service nobility, but the provisos that demoted women for not marrying knights encouraged, not their numerical growth, but their reduction, in favour of a more socially restricted caballero class whose women now had so much to lose when they married outside it. [125] In other words, a man who married into a knight's family did not, for that reason, have to be admitted among the municipal elite. A knight's widow, free to marry whom she pleased, was conditionally better provided for than his daughter, and she might easily pass up just any opportunity to marry again. She was also likely to possess or develop strong opinions about the acceptability of her daughters' suitors.

A widowed duenna could doubtless cut a figure in her community although she might share the family's house with her children, or even move to a more modest abode than the family dwelling. No ordinary townswoman, she was perhaps not herself the daughter of a knight. A woman could ascend by marriage into the ranks of the municipal gentry, just as she could descend by marrying out of it. Marriage to aman who was or became a member of the military elite was a woman's gateway to high social status, local influence and substantial economic advantages, all of which increased with the growing importance of the knights' profession during the thirteenth century. The charms and attractions of amarriageable knight outshone his armour, whether or not the woman who aspired to marry him was the daughter of such a man. If the horse gave a townsman access to the privileges of a noble, the betrothal ring unlocked the same door for his sister. A townsman who lacked the background, ability and ambition to pursue a military career was becoming a less and less alluring marriage prospect for the widows and daughters of caballeros. He also possessed fewer charms for ordinary townswomen and eager parents of girls with a bent for social climbing.

Castilian daughters who married beneath them apparently acquiesced in their lower station with great reluctance. According to a custom preserved in the early fourteenth-century Fuero Viejo, the widow of a man who was an ordinary townsman but the daughter of a noble knight could reclaim her birth rank as a fijadalgo by performing a ritual of renunciation over her late husband's grave and ordering the dead man to take back the low status that marriage had imposed upon her. Shouldering a pack saddle, symbol of the burden she bore, she struck his grave with the pack and repeated three times, 'Villano toma tu villania, da a mi mia fidalguia.' ⁽⁹⁶⁾ Such a widow, accustomed to the prerogatives that may have been gained by her father but who forfeited them by marriage to a man who did not possess them, sought to recover her former eminence by renouncing or even denouncing her late husband. She took back her maiden name, as it were, and [126] affirmed her claims to the noble birth of her father. Her graveside demand was a more vigorous denial than that made by a widowed noblewoman (infanzona) of lower Navarre who had been married secretly to an ordinary man, or was at least thought to have spent three nights under the same roof with him. Unless she failed to make the customary expressions of a widow in mourning, by covering her head and tearing her face over his grave and then grieving there for a week, she was declared a villana forever. ⁽⁹⁷⁾ These were indeed extraordinary measures for a widow to take to regain the high status of her birth. A woman's social standing as a wife and widow was expected to follow that of her husband, not her father. The widow who renounced or denied her marriage defied the convention that a woman's rank derived from her husband's achievements, but she challenged it only when their absence had downgraded her. Whether or not aristocratic daughters and those from a town's best families actually rebelled as widows against the disgrace of a socially demeaning marriage, it was becoming increasingly necessary to warn them of its danger. The ascending fortunes of the municipal gentry made it imperative to arrange most carefully adaughter's future and prevent her from making the terrible mistake of marrying beneath her.

1. FSalamanca 299

2. Etymol. 11.1.123; cf. III Toledo 22, VC, pp. 132-3.

3. Chronica Adefonsi imperatoris, ed. Sanchez Belda, c. 61, p. 49. Chronique latine des rois de Castille jusqu'en 1236, ed. G. Cirot (Bordeaux, 1913), c. 20, p. 58. Primera crónica general, ed. Menéndez Pidal, c. 737, vol. 2, p. 434.

4. FZamora 87. FSoria 313, 315. FAlba 129. Cortes of Valladolid (1258), pet. 25 (Cones, vol. I, p. 59). Cf. FViguera 272. Cf. the late thirteenth-century 'Ordenanzas municipales de Estella', ed. Lacarra, AHDE 5, (1928), 434-45, cap. 47.

5. Etymol. 9.7.16; De eccles. off 2.19.1, 4, 6. The ordo, 'Benedictio super viduas mafortem accipientes' (Liber Ordinum, ed. Férotin, cols. 80-1), lacking rubrics, consists of a simple prayer of consecration for 'imitatrices Anne uidue', a text ignored by J. Mayer, Monumenta de viduis diaconissis virginibusque tractantia, Florilegium Patristicum, 42 (Bonn, 1938). Cf. III Toledo io, VC, p. 128; IV Toledo 56, ibid., p. 210; X Toledo 4, 5, ibid., pp. 311-13.

6. E.g., Gonzalez, Alfonso VIII, vol. I, pp. 505-40.

7. Ibid., pp. 602-5; idem, Repoblación, vol. 2, pp. 144-9, 255-62.

8. E.g., FCuenca 2.2; FTeruel 423. FGuadalajara 66. FSepúlveda 24. FSoria 322. FPlasencia 23. FCoria 315. FCarmona 21. Cf. FViejo 4.1.5., with precedents in the older regional Castilian codes.

9. Kofman de Guarrochena and Carzolio de Rossi ('Acerca de la demografia', pp. 153-5) suggest that their numbers remained in balance during the Reconquest.

10. FJaca mss C, D 1. Le Clercq, 'Veuvage, veuve', DACL, vol. 15, pt 2 (Paris, 1953), cols. 3007-23.

11. FCuenca 10.11, 12, 15; FIznatoraf 188, 189, 192; FAlarcón 181-3; FAlcaraz 3.85, 86, 89; FBaeza 192, 193, 196; FZorita 195, 196, 199, with variations; FBéjar 239-41, 245-7; FPlasencia 466,467, 470. Also FTeruel 430, 431, but only when the heirs were children, not other relatives; then each paid half of debts claimed after partition had been completed (cap. 432); FLTeruel 324. Only half is due when each spouse dies, in, e.g., FSoria 400, FReal 3.18.5, FBrihuega, pp. 147, 148, and FSepúlveda 64b.

12. FCuenca 10.15; FIznatoraf 192; FAlarcón 183; FAlcaraz 3.89; FBaeza 196; FBéjar 246; FPlasencia 470. Changed by Meyoría 19, ed. Ureña, Fuero de Cuenca, p. 843, as provided for also in FViejo 5.2.3. Cf FAlcalá 43 and LF 97.

13. Cf., e.g., FCuenca 10.26, FGuadalajara 99, FCoria 82, FSoria 344, 345, and FViejo 5.3.1, 2. Martinez Gijón, 'La comunidad hereditaria', pp. 221-303.

14. FDaroca, MC, p. 642. Cf FToledo (1118), ibid., p. 364; FToledo 9 (c. 1166), below, n. 90. E. Gacto Fernández, La condición jurídica del conyuge viudo en el derecho visigodo y en los fueros de León y Castilla (Seville, 1975).

15. FPampliega, Alfonso VIII, vol. 3, p. 466 (a pactum, covering land and movables, vowing perpetual chastity), as perhaps similar to FCuenca 10.36 ('unitas'); FTeruel 450; FIznatoraf 213 ('hermandad'), 214; FAlarcón 203; FAlcaraz 3.110; FBaeza 217; FZorita 2,8; FBéjar 271, 272; FPlasencia 484. Cf. the vague FSoria 341 ('unidad'), FSalamanca 208 ('undade'), and FLedesma 134 ('whatever they decide'). By FReal 3.6.9 the ill-defined 'hermandad' was void when there were children or stepchildren. Cf. FCoria 73 ('se permediar'); FCáceres 80 ('unitas'), as FUsagre 81.

16. FDaroca, MC, p. 542. FAlcalá 84. Cf. FAlba 70. But see Martinez Gijón, 'El regimen', pp. 88-95; I suspect permissible variations in these 'sharings'.

17. LV and FJuzgo 4.5.1, and cf. 4.2.11, 19, 20. FReal 3.5.10. Mandatory 'quinta' in, e.g., FEscalona 17, FCuenca 9.9, FPlasencia 4, FSoria 295, FBrihuega, p. 155. Cf. LF 208.

18. FAvilés 23, 24; FOviedo, pp. 125-6. FLedesma 7, 10, 139. FSalamanca 31, 34, 213, 304, 305. FCastroverde, Alfonso IX, vol. 2, p. 231. Cf. FReal 3.5.11.

19. FBrihuega, p. 155. LF 276 (Cereso). FCoria 74; FCáceres 82, FUsagre 82. FAlcalá 81. FSepúlveda 66. Otero, 'Mandas', pp. 399-411.

20. The reservation is repeated in FCuenca 9.11, 10.28; FIznatoraf 174, 205; FAlarcón 166, 196; FAlcaraz 3.71, 3.102; FBaeza 178, 209; FZorita 181, 212. FBéjar 221, 260, FTeruel 420, 443. Also FPlasencia 4. FSoria 297, but confirmation is not required except for a spouse; cf cap. 295-315, most following FReal. For resistance to interconjugal testation allowed by Mejoría 12 (1285, ed. Ureña, Fuero de Cuenca, p. 851), see FPlasencia 743, 748; the erosion of controls on diverse interconjugal benefits is perceptible in FLa Novenera 87, 117, 176, 207, 239, 241; cf. FEstella 2.11.6 and FSan Sebastián 3.9.6.

21. LF 68.

22. FSalamanca 206; FLedesma 133. FCoria 68; FCáceres 77; FUsagre 77. FAlfambra 40. FValfermoso, CD, p. 124. Otero, 'Aventajas o mejoría, bienes excluidos de partición en beneficio del cónyuge sobreviviente', AHDE 30 (1960), 492-552.

23. FCuenca 10.42, 43; FIznatoraf 221, 222; FAlarcón 209, 210; FAlcaraz 3.116, 117; FBaeza 224, 225; FZorita 224, 225; FBéjar 284-6; FTeruel 458-60; FPlasencia 490. FCoria 68, 72; FCáceres 77, 79; FUsagre 77, 80. FSoria 325; FReal 3.6.6. FValfermoso, CD, p. 124. FAlfambra 40. FLa Novenera 64, 65; short FViguera 66. The bed is given as a perquisite of the widow only in FSalamanca 206 and FLedesma 133, as well as LF 269; PON 20; POL 53 and FViejo 5.1.5. It is omitted from the lists in FAlcalá 81 and FAlba 143.

24. FSalamanca 206; FLedesma 133. FAlba 143. FCoria 68; FCáceres 77; FUsagre 77. FAlcalá 81. FBrihuega, p. 182; FFuentes 192. LF 269; PON 20, 101; POL 53, 55; FViejo 5.1.1, 5.

25. FAlba 143. FCoria 72; FCáceres 79; FUsagre 80. FSoria 338. LF 268, everyday clothes only. By FAlfambra 40 she took all and could bequeath them to whom she chose.

26. FSoria 338. FViguera 396. FJaca ms B 136 (Pamplona).

27. FLa Novenera 64, short FViguera 66. LF 269; PON 20, 101; POL 53, 66; FViejo 5.1.1, 5.

28. FCuenca 10.42, et fora alia. FCoria 68, 72, et fora alia. FSalamanca 206; and the shorter list in FLedesma 133. By FAlfambra 40 and FValfermoso (CD, p. 124) widow and widower keep the same things; by FTeruel 458, 459 a widower who does not take a horse, arms and hunting birds (i.e., a man who is not a municipal knight) gets the bed and the same subsistence-holding as a widow.

29. FSalamanca 206, 213, FLedesma 133, 139. FCoria 68; FCáceres 77; FUsagre 77. FBrihuega, p. 182; FFuentes 191. FAlcalá 81. FValfermoso, CD, p. 124. For chastity as a necessary condition for keeping arras and wedding gifts, see FReal 3.12.9, as well as PON 101; POL 66; FViejo 5.1.1; and cf. FViguera 389, 394. See LV and FJuzgo 5.2.5.

30. FCuenca 10.42, 43, et fora alia, above, n. 23. FPlasencia 490. FAlfambra 40. Cf FUclés 29 and FPampliega, Alfonso VIII, vol. 3, p. 466.

31. FSalamanca 205, FLedesma 132. FCoria 68; FCáceres 77; FUsagre 77. Cf. FPlasencia 479, and the decrees of the Bishop of Osma attached to Soria's tax roll of 1270, ed. E. Jimeno, 'La población de Soria y su término en 1270 según el padrón que mandó hacer Alfonso X de sus vecinos y moradores', BRAH 143 (1958), 431, 433-5.

32. E.g., FSahagún (1110), MC, p. 307, Barrero Garcia, 'Los fueros de Sahagún', AHDE 42 (1972), 385-497. FDaroca, MC, p. 538. FMolina, p. 76 FZamora 7. FUclés 71. FBrihuega, pp. 154-5. For the nine-day child of FDaroca, MC, p. 541, FCuenca 10.1 and 30, et fora alia, see Maldonado, La condición jurídica del 'nasciturus' en el derecho español (Madrid, 1946), pp. 77-83, 99-107. By LV 4.2.18 it must live for ten days, and by FLTeruel 338 and FTeruel 445, 446, a year and a day.

33. FCoria 82, cf. FCáceres 89 and FUsagre 90; Maldonado, El fuero de Coria, pp. cclxxiv-cclxxvi. FAlcalá 27. FSoria 319.

34. FSalamanca 207, 330a (ms C); FLedesma 135, 197. FCuenca 10.1, 13; FIznatoraf 178, 189-91; FAlarcón 170, 171, 182; FAlcaraz 3.75, 87; FBaeza 182, 194; FZorita 185, 197; FBéjar 225, 242, 243. Cf. FPlasencia 469 and the later cap. 744.

35. FSepúlveda 67. FPlasencia 6, and cf. FLa Novenera 205.

36. FAlcalá 27. FL Teruel 323 and FTeruel 430, following in part FCuenca 10.11, et fora alia. FSepulveda 67.

37. FBrihuega, p. 167; FFuentes 111. FSoria 323; FReal 3.6.3. Cf. FSalamanca 209; FLedesma 136, but see cap. 197.

38. FCuenca 10.30, 31, 33; FIznatoraf 207, 208, 210; FAlarcón 198, 200; FAlcaraz 3.104, 105, 107; FBaeza 211, 212, 214; FZorita 213, 214, 216; FBéjar 262-4, 266. Also FPlasencia 480, 482 and FTeruel 445, 448, but with substantial variations.

39. FBrihuega, p. 166; FFuentes 107. FCuenca 10.34, et fora alia (twelve). FPlasencia 483 (thirteen). FAlcalá 154 (fourteen). FSoria 165 and FViejo 5.4.3 (sixteen). FLedesma 200 (fifteen for boys, girls until they marry). FCoria 83; FCáceres 92; and FUsagre 93 (fifteen for both, as LV and FJuzgo 4.3.1); many fueros give simply 'de edade'. Martinez Gijón, 'Los sistemas de tutela y administración de los bienes de los menores en el derecho local de Castilla y León', AHDE 51 (1971), 9-31. For the rather different Visigothic tutelage, but preferring the widow over the child's adult brothers and uncles, see LV 4.3.3, 4.2 13, 14 and FJuzgo 4.3.3, 4.2.14, 15; King, Law and Society, pp. 236-7, 241-5.

40. FZamora 24. FSalamanca 330a (ms C); FLedesma 197.

41. Cortes of León (1188), Alfonso IX, vol. 2, p. 27, and its repetitions in the Constitutiones of 1194 (ibid., p. 128) and Cortes of León, 1208 (Cortes, vol. 1, pp. 51-2). FAlcalá 53, 68. FLedesma 201. LF 298, PON 19; FViejo 5.4.4.

42. FSalamanca 366, 205.

43. FCuenca, Cod. Val. 1.10.30 ('de buena fama'). FSoria 359 ('cuerdo e de buen testimonio'), as FReal 3.7.1 which also requires prosperity. FViguera 394 (De fealdat) lists, in addition to child neglect, remarriage, notorious unchastity, cutting down fruit trees and other property abuses as justifications for withdrawal of arras, not tutelage, from an infanzona.

44. FCuenca 10.34; FIznatoraf 211; FAlarcón 201; FAlcaraz 3.108; FBaeza 215; FBéjar 267-9; FTeruel 448 Cf FReal 3.7.3. FReal 3.7.2 (following LV and FJuzgo 4.3.3) allows the tutor a tenth of income for minimum expense; a small sum is permitted by FSoria 359.

45. Initial preference for the widowed barragana is implied here, as in FCuenca 10.30, et fora alia, especially FTeruel 445, 448 (above, n. 38).

46. FZorita 217. FPlasencia 483. FValfermoso, CD, p. 124. FBrihuega, p 166; FFuentes 107. FCoria 83; FCáceres 92, FUsagre 93. FSoria 358, 350. LF 104, 243, 244. FViejo 5.4.1-4.

47. FBrihuega, p. 166, FFuentes 107. FSoria 358, 359. For the intervention of town officials, see also FAlcalá 53, 68, FLedesma 201, LF 104, 298, FReal 3.7.1, and FViejo 5.4.1.

48. FSalamanca 330; FLedesma 200, 201. Cf. above, n. 40.

49. FSan Sebastián 3.9 4, 5, 11-14, 3.6.1-3; FEstella 2.11.4, 5, 11-14; 2.12.1-3 (norms lacking in FJaca). Somewhat differently, Martinez Gijón, 'Los sistemas de tutela y administración de los bienes de los menores en el derecho local de Navarra', AHDE 40 (1970), 235-9.

50. FSoria 359; FReal 3.7.2, 3. LV 4.2.13; FJuzgo 4.2.14 but lacking the discrepancies found in different parts of LV.

51. FCuenca 10.16-20; FIznatoraf 193-7; FAlarcón 184-8; FAlcaraz 3.90-94; FBaeza 197-201; FZorita 200-4; FBéjar 248-53; FTeruel 433-6; FPlasencia 471-5. FSoria 339, 340. Cf. LF 143; FViejo 5.3.9. On the need for partition before remarriage, see also FBrihuega, p. 155; and FSan Sebastián 3.6.1, as FEstella 2.12.1, but it did not invariably occur here either (FSan Sebastián 3.9.12; FEstella 2.11.12, and above n. 49).

52. Ordenanzas de Santiago (1440), ed. Sáez, Los Fueros de Sepúlveda, Ap. 41, pp. 241-2; the custom is not described in FSepúlveda. By FReal 3.4.6, a stepparent was entitled to half of all the acquisitions gained before partition, thus voiding FCuenca's 'division by beds'.

53. FCuenca 10.23-5; FIznatoraf 200-2; FAlarcón 191-3; FAlcaraz 3.97-9; FBaeza 204-6; FZorita 207-9; FBéjar 256-8; FTeruel 439, 440; FSoria 346. See also FBrihuega, p. 154 and FValfermoso, CD, p. 122.

54. FCoria 76; FCáceres 83; FUsagre 84. For oaths and witnesses to partition, especially by in-laws, see FSoria 352 and FCoria 334; FCáceres 317; FUsagre 377.

55. LF 293; the fazaña is repeated in FViejo 5.3.3.

56. FPalenzuela (1074), MC, p. 284; FSan Juan de Celia (1209), Alfonso VIII, vol. 3, p. 497; FVillauerde (before 1214), ibid., p. 638.

57. See, e.g., FAgüero 6 (1224), ND, p. 127, and the charter from Santa Maria de Rioseco (1256), ibid., pp. 165-6. For huesas, see above, Ch. 2, n. 22.

58. FLara (1135), MC, p. 521. FBalbás (1135), ibid., p. 516. FSalinas (1148), LLN, vol. 4, p. 113. FCovarrubias 1 (1148), ND, p. 62. FDurango (c. 1180), LLN, vol. 4, pp. 255-6.

59. FCueva-Cardiel (1052) and FVillalmunder (1142), ed. Hergueta, 'Fueros de Cueva-Cardiel y Vallalmunder (provincia de Burgos)', RABM 16 (1907), 418-19, with widowers included after 1270 (ibid., p. 421). FPeralta (1144), MC, p. 548. FLa Novenera 220. FLarraon (1192), LLN, vol. 4, p. 324.

60. FLa Novenera 236. FDurango, LLN, vol. 4, pp. 255-6. FIbrillos (before 1214), Alfonso VIII, vol. 3, p. 651.

61. FSanta María de la Vega 17 (1217), ND, p. 112. FAbelgas (1217), ed. Gonzalez, 'Aportación de fueros castellano-leoneses', p. 647. Similarly, FCirueña (972), ed. Martínez Díez, 'Fueros de la Rioja', p. 395. Cf Becerro: Libro de las behetrías (1352), ed. Hernández, pp. 195, 228-31, 240.

62. FVillasila and FVillamelendo (1180), Alfonso VIII, vol. 2, p. 556. FSalinas de Añana (1192), ibid., vol. 3, p. 122 (for fonsadera).

63. FCueva-Cardiel (1052) and FVillalmunder (1142), ed. Hergueta, 'Fueros', pp. 418-19 (above, n. 59). FLara, MC, p.521. Additions to FCalahorra (1181), Alfonso VIII, vol. 2, p. 651. FHaro (1187), ibid., p. 805. FIbrillos (before 1214), ibid., vol. 3, p. 651.

64. E.g., FCuenca 30.3, 4, 6; FIznatoraf 64l, 642, 646; FAlarcón 593, 594, 598; FAlcaraz 10.3, 4, 6; FBaeza 672, 673, 675; FZorita 611, 612, 614; FBéjar 895, 896, 899; FTeruel 573, 574; FPlasencia 494, 495, 497.

65. Urraca's additions to FLeón and FCarrión (1109), MC, pp. 48-9. FNájera (1076), ibid., p. 290. FAlcalá 267. FBrihuega, p. 183, 188; FFuentes 193 and, partially, cap. 218. Cf. FEstella I.2; 2.15 and cf ms C 67 and FViguera 262. But cf. A. Palomeque Torres, 'Contribución al estudio del ejército en los estados de la Reconquista', AHDE 15 (1944), 309-10.

66. FTeruel and FLTeruel 10; FAlbarracín 7.

67. FCoria 136; FCáceres 245; FUsagre 260.

68. FLedesma 327; see also cap. 326-31, 272.

69. FDaroca, MC, p. 543.

70. FViguera 48, 188, 189.

71. FZamora 6.

72. FCuenca 10.37, 38; FIznatoraf 215, 2,6; FAlarcón 204, 205; FAlcaraz 3.111, 112; FBaeza 218, 219; FZorita 219, 220; FBéjar 273-6; FTeruel 451, 452; FPlasencia 485, 486. LF 130 (Burgos), 131; FViejo 5.3.8. Cf FBrihuega, p. 159 and FSoria 349.

73. FSoria 361, largely following FReal 3.8.1, where the stipend was cut in half after remarriage and brothers and sisters could also be called to contribute. Cf FJaca ms A 258.

74. E.g., FMiranda 27 (1099). Guglielmi, 'Posada y yantar, contribución al estudio del léxico de las instituciones medievales', Hispania 26 (1966), 5-40, 165-219.

75. FNajera, MC, p. 291. FCoria 136, FCáceres 245; FUsagre 260. Cantera Burgos (Fuero de Miranda de Ebro, p. 122) supposes that FNájera implies ius primae noctis, but neither this nor any other such text justifies this assumption.

76. See esp. FSahagún (1152), MC, p. 310, where the abbot's men were a persistent nuisance. FAvilés 4; FOviedo, p. 114. FSanabria (1220), Alfonso IX, vol. 2, p. 516.

77. FSan Cebrián (1125), HD, p. 52. FCastrotorafe (1129), MC, p. 481. Flara (1135), MC, p. 522, FPozuelo de Campos 6 (1157?), HD, p. 65. FZorita (1180), Alfonso VIII, vol.2, pp. 572-3. FBrihuega, p. 159 (not in FFuentes). FCastroverde (1202), Alfonso IX, vol. 2, p. 228. FSan Roman (1222), ibid., p. 540. Sometimes one of the trio, usually clerics, is missing, as, e.g., FSanta Cristina (1062), MC, p. 179. FMarañón (before 1134), ibid., p. 497. FLUclés 12 (1179). FViguera 8. FIbrillos (before 1214), Alfonso VIII, vol. 3, p. 651. FAlcalá 23.

78. FPalenzuela (1074), MC, p. 284; FSan Juan de Celia (1209), Alfonso VIII, vol. 3, p. 497; FVillaverde (before 1214), ibid., p. 638. FBalbás (1135), MC, p. 514. FBelbimbre (1187), Alfonso VIII, vol. 2, p. 818. Cf FNájera (1076), MC, p. 290. FCaparroso (1102), ibid., p. 342. FPeraita (1144), ibid., p. 548. FCovarrubias 8 (1148), HD, p. 63. FVillavicencio (1166, 1229), MC, pp. 176, 179. FMedinaceli (1180s), ibid., p. 440.

79. E.g. LF 296. FAlba 37, 40. FZamora 80. FAlcalá 261. FLedesma 363. FCoria 193. FViejo 2.1.8. FSoria 147; FReal 1.10.4, 5. LV and FJuzgo 2.3.6.

80. LF 254.

81. FCuenca 24.26, 36, et fora alia. FAlba 54, characteristically naming both women and men as possible litigants.

82. FAlcalá 123, 177 and FBrihuega, p. 158 name widows and orphans. FPlasencia 332. FSalamanca 256, 258, 259; FLedesma 173, 175, 176. This advocacy was normally the duty and privilege of the head of a household (e.g., FSalamanca 255 and the charters, ed. de Onis, Fueros leoneses, pp. 70, 71).

83. FSoria 137, 140, 148, 151. For the lawyer, cf FReal 1.9 (De los bozeros)and 1.10 (De los personeros). For women as well as men in litigation with a priest, see FCoria 193; FCáceres 199; FUsagre 202.

84. FSalamanca 257, 273.

85. FCoria 9, 32, 142, 261, FCáceres 10, 37, 145, 252; FUsagre II, 36, 146, 268.

86. FSalamanca 183.

87. FGuadalajara 61.

88. FCáceres 403-6, 437; FUsagre 444-7, 479. Bishko, 'The Castilian as plainsman: The medieval ranching frontier in La Mancha and Extremadura', ed. Lewis and McGann, The New World looks at its history, pp. 47-69; repr. as 'El castellano hombre de llanura: La explotación ganadera en la area fronteriza de la Mancha y Extremadura durante la edad media', Homenaje a Vicens Vines, vol. 1 (Barcelona, 1965), pp. 201-18.

89. The earliest elaboration is FZorita (1180), Alfonso VIII, vol. 2, p. 576; C. Pescador del Hoyo, 'La caballeria popular en León y Castilla', CHE 39-40 (1964), 160-4. See A. Bo and Carlé, 'Cuando empieza a reservarse a los caballeros el gobierno de las ciudades castellanas', CHE 4 (1946), 114-24; Carlé, 'Infanzones e hidalgos', CHE 33-4 (1961), 58-100.

90. FToledo (1118), MC, p. 364; repeated in FToledo 9 (c. 1166) FCórdoba-Cartegena (1241, 1246), p. 31, FCarmona 8. For the fueros of Alicante, Lorca, Aledo and Totona, see Pescador, 'La caballeria popular', CHE 35-6 (1962), 93-4.

91. FLPalencia 16, and see FPampliega, vol 3, p. 466, for the knight's or alcalde's widow excused from the public portions of fines.

92. Privilegios to Peñafiel, MHE, vol. 1, p. 90; Cuéllar, ed. A. Ubieto Arteta, Colección diplomática de Cuéllar (Segovia, 1961), p. 43; Atienza, 'El fuero de Atienza', ed. A. Ballesteros y Beretta, BRAH 68 (1916), 267; Buitrago, MHE, vol. 1, p. 94; Burgos, ibid., p. 98. Not all such grants of FReal contain these broad exemptions, e.g., grants to Arcos de la Frontera (ibid., pp. 86-8), Talavera (ibid., pp. 124-6), and Niebla (ibid., pp. 202-4). For an evaluation of the privilege at Burgos, see T. F. Ruiz, 'The transformation of the Castilian municipalities' The case of Burgos 1248-1350', Past and Present 77 (1977), 3-32.

93. Privilegios to Escalona (1261), MHE, vol. 1, p. 179, Madrid (1262), HD, p. 170; Guadalajara (1262), ed. F. Layna Serrano, Guadalajara y sus Mendozas (4 vols., Madrid, 1942), vol. 1, p. 265. The privilegio giving FReal to Valladolid (1265) is similar (MHE, vol. I, pp. 226-7).

94. 'Alfonso X de Castilla, a petición a los habitantes de las villas de Extremadura, desagravia a los de Cuéllar, completando algunos puntos de los fueros que tenian', ed. Ubieta Arteta, Colección diplomática de Cuéllar, pp. 60-6. Procter prints a different cuaderno from Peñafiel (Curia and Cones, pp. 286-91), omitting the possible loss of the 'quinientos sueldos'.

95. FSepúlveda 42c, 198; see cap. 48, 63, ,86. Cf FViejo 1.5.12. The extent of the exemptions of a knight's widow and daughter varied from town to town; cf., e.g., the privilegios given in 1273 to Seville, MHE, vol. 1, p. 293, and Cáceres, ed. A. Cumbreño Floriano, Documentación histórica del archivo municipal de Cáceres, vol. 1: 1217-1504 (Cáceres, 1934), p. 21. But see Pescador, 'La caballeria popular', CHE 35-6 (1962), 93-4.

96. FViejo 1.5.17, said to embody a fazaña. Aman lost his 'nobredat' and became a 'villano' when he fell on bad times, but if his fortunes improved, he could reclaim his and his children's 'quinientos sueldos' by denouncing publicly his 'vecindat' while stamping on a peasant's goad (FViejo 1.5.16). For the possibility of a man changing his status by marriage in Aragon, see, e.g., Compilación privada de derecho aragonés 53, ed. Ramos y Loscertales, 'Textos para el estudio del derecho aragonés', AHDE I (1924), pp. 400-8.

97. FViguera 272; cf cap 271. For the widow's mantle, see LF 52.