Studia Historica: Historia Moderna (Dec 2011)
PATRIMONIAL INTEGRITY, PERPETUITY, MEMORY. THE CONTRADICTIONS OF ENTAILED ESTATES IN EARLY MODERN VALENCIA
Abstract
The practice of entail, a key source of stability for the patrimony of thenobility over the centuries, nonetheless created its own contradictions. Several of thesearose, in the case of Valencia, from the normative changes that followed the decrees ofthe Nueva Planta, due to the differences between Castilian law and the abolished Valencian fueros. But many other contradictions resulted from the inconsistent regulation ofentail under the fueros; from debates over the law; from the sometimes confused stipulations of the founders; and even from uncertainty over the purpose of the entailedproperties. This article, drawing on disputes over entailed estates brought before theAudiencia of Valencia, will analyze problems including ambiguity in terminology; the contention between primogeniture and appeals for plural inheritance; the difficultyin defining the established order of succession; the incompatibility question; the extinction of inheritance for lack of descendants; the acceptance of illegitimate children and clerics;previously arranged disinheritance; the extension of the encumbrance in perpetuity; therecognition of real rights against entailed properties; and the alienation of parts of entailedestates under certain circumstances.
