Fiscalitat municipal sobre productes alimentaris a Castelló d’Empúries (1350–1375)

Abstract

During the 14th century, Catalan towns, together with those in the rest of the Crown of Aragon, issued enormous quantities of long-term debt, which took the form of sales of perpetual and lifelong annuities ("censals morts" and "violaris"), in order to finance their numerous economic needs of different types. As a consequence of the growing issuing of debt instruments, town governments had to build a fiscal system of increasing complexity to satisfy the rising annual interests. The system was based on a set of indirect taxes over commerce and the consumption of certain food and manufactured products. Castello d’Empuries was not an exception and the town engaged and consolidated long-term debt between approximately 1350 and 1375. This article analyses the evolution of the taxes on food that the town government of Castello was administering during this period (yield, tariffs and exempt groups), applied on wine and grapes, meat, cereal milling, bread, oil, fish and pigs. On these grounds, the article assesses whether the increasing town debt resulted in a growing tax pressure on its inhabitants, and offers an overview of the main food types that were commercialised in Castello during the 14th century.