Remensa (
Catalan
Catalan may refer to:
Catalonia
From, or related to Catalonia:
* Catalan language, a Romance language
* Catalans, an ethnic group formed by the people from, or with origins in, Northern or southern Catalonia
Places
* 13178 Catalan, asteroid #1 ...
: ''Remença'') was a Catalan mode of
serfdom. Those who were serfs under this mode are properly ''pagesos de remença'' (''pagesos'' meaning "peasants"); they are often (though not quite correctly) referred to simply as ''remences'' (singular ''remença'').
The Catalan term ''remença'' derives from the
Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
''redementia'' and emphasizes the possibility of redemption from
servitude.
The severity of this way of life led to rebellions by the remensa peasants in 1462 and 1485 known as the
War of the Remences. After the second revolt, King
Ferdinand II of Aragon issued the ''
Sentencia de Guadalupe
The ''Sentencia Arbitral de Guadalupe'' (Arbitral Decision of Guadalupe) was a legal decree delivered by King Ferdinand II of Aragon at the Monastery of Santa María de Guadalupe in Extremadura, Spain on 21 April 1486 to free the Catalan reme ...
'' (1486), outlawing the more severe abuses of the oppressive
evil customs
Evil customs (Catalan: ''mals usos'', lit. "bad uses") were specific medieval feudal customs, generally levies, which peasants were subjected to by their feudal lords in the Crown of Aragon and other European countries. These obligations are relate ...
and allowing remensa peasants to be redeemed by a payment of 60
sous per household, leaving a rural society that was still
feudal in character, but significantly reformed.
[Nunez, Clara, Eugenia, and Tortella, Gabriel. "Economic Development and the Problems of National State Formation: The Case of Spain". In Teichova, Alice, and Matis, Herbert, (ed.) ''Nation, State And The Economy In History''. Cambridge; ]Cambridge University Press
Cambridge University Press is the university press of the University of Cambridge. Granted letters patent by King Henry VIII in 1534, it is the oldest university press in the world. It is also the King's Printer.
Cambridge University Pre ...
, 2011 (p.115)
See also
*
History of Catalonia
Catalonia was first settled during the Middle Palaeolithic era. Like the rest of the Mediterranean side of the Iberian Peninsula, the area was occupied by the Iberians and several Greek colonies were established on the coast before the Roman c ...
*
Principality of Catalonia
*
Catalan Civil War
The Catalan Civil War, also called the Catalonian Civil War or the War against John II, was a civil war in the Principality of Catalonia, then part of the Crown of Aragon, between 1462 and 1472. The two factions, the royalists who supported John ...
*
Spain in the Middle Ages
Spain in the Middle Ages is a period in the History of Spain that began in the 5th Century following the Fall of the Western Roman Empire and ended with the beginning of the Early modern period in 1492.
The history of Spain is marked by waves ...
References
External links
"La qüestió remença"
Crown of Aragon
Peasant revolts
Medieval Spain
{{Catalonia-hist-stub