Beschreibung
Manuscript on paper written in 3 different coloured inks. Small folio. 1 blank leaf + [22]p + 2 blank leaves + [12]p. With 2 illuminated calligraphic title-pages, first title with arms of Buenos Aires in tailend section, a variety of exquisite floral and animal ornamentation on titles and in 21 headings, including 6 charming landscape vignettes, decorative initials. Text ruled in 9 columns, one of which represents cattle-brand marks; line borders in red throughout. Calf folder. Colonial manuscript of extraordinary rarity and quality executed in the best tradition of Spanish calligraphy, and in an excellent state of preservation. Comprising detailed government reports on fiscal contributions for the year 1797 from estancias (farms) and pulperias (general store owners) in the districts and villages in the vicinity of Buenos Aires, capital of the Viceroyalty of Rio de la Plata, in the closing years of the 18th century. The alcavala (or alcabala) of the title was a Spanish sales tax applicable to all property contracts. In the register the farm is numbered, and the table provides the name of the owner, the amount of their livestock (cattle, sheep, mules) the individual brand mark, the farm s location and its distance in relation to nearby estates. The final column lists the tax paid in pesos. Among owners some 25 women are named. Three notes in the addenda of the first report, list: firstly, eight individuals who could not be found on their farms as they were in Buenos Aires (their head of cattle is noticeably high); secondly, a further eight assessed (owning even larger numbers of cattle, though brand marks are not given), whose owners were not to be found (all are of noble origin and were possibly in Spain). The first section is signed by the assessor, Vicente Benito Cretel. He points out that the sum total of cattle here listed comprises bulls, steers, cows, oxen and other pasture animals, but it is only the second category (steers, nobillos) sold for the provision of supplies (hides, meat etc) which are liable for the tax. The second report lists some 115 pulperos (general store owners) liable to pay the tax. The headings of each of these are of particular iconographic interest for the delicately painted landscape vignettes which are among the earliest known graphic representations of the local topography and its flora and fauna. Each of the two reports is signed by the government official Don Vicente Benito Cretel and dated respectively 17th March and 30th April 1797. Cretel features in a list of 23 patriotic citizens who were granted the title ciudadanos americanos de la Provincias Unidad for donations towards the cause of liberty (Gazeta Ministerial del Gobierno de Buenos Ayres, No 10, 12 de Agosto de 1812, p40). Notable throughout is the high quality of the calligraphy, and its experimental variations. On the last page, each of the final ten lines of the document is written and illuminated in a different style of calligraphy, including one line in mirror writing. A highly important social document of the period, and a most exquisitely presented visual record. The vital importance to the economy and predominant position of the cattle industry to Argentina is reflected in the guild of cattle breeders and farmers being admitted by 1797 to the Consulado, the Chamber of Commerce (founded 1794), which stipulated customs revenues. John Lynch, 'Spanish Colonial adminsitration, 1782-1810. The Intendant System in the Viceroyalty of the Río de la Plata', University of London, Athlone Press, 1958. Bestandsnummer des Verkäufers ABE-1632993231363
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