La red urbana en Castilla la Nueva en los siglos XVI y XVII

Abstract

Constituted by the Kingdom of Toledo and the bishpric of Cuenca, New Castile was the heart of the kingdom during the Spanish Siglo de Oro. Dominated by the great city of Toledo for quite a long time, it sees the growth of a new capital, Madrid. After a rivalry of 40 years, the latter takes control de_finitively of the regional economy. This competition monopolyzed the attention of Urban History and left al/ the other components of the network of cities which animated one of the most dynamic regions of the XV!th century on a second plane. In the XV!Ith century, this group experiences the modifications caused by the change of regional leadership. Resides, it suffers an epoch of demographic depression and economic changes at the same time as other Spanish urban centres, but to such a grave degree that it loses its directing role in national economy. This brief synthesis, in the author's own words, gives a good idea of the contents of this article, although it also offers quantitative data with regard to those key processes and analyzes them .from demographic and economic points of view