The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic — Volume 1

by William Hickling Prescott

[49] Blancas, Modo de Proceder, fol. 102.

[50] Not, however, it must be allowed, without a manly struggle in its defence, and which, in the early part of Charles V.'s reign, in 1525, wrenched a promise from the crown, to answer all petitions definitively, before the rising of cortes. The law still remains on the statute-book, (Recop. de las Leyes, lib. 6, tit. 7, ley 8,) a sad commentary on the faith of princes.

[51] Práctica y Estilo, p. 14.

[52] "Y nos tenemos á ellos como buenos vassallos y compañeros."—Zurita, Anales, lib. 7, cap. 17.

[53] The noun "justicia" was made masculine for the accommodation of this magistrate, who was styled "el justicia." Antonio Perez, Relaciones, fol. 91.

[54] Blancas, Commentarii, p. 26.—Zurita, Anales, tom. i. fol. 9.

[55] Molinus, apud Blancas, Commentarii, pp. 343, 344.—Fueros y Observancias, tom. i. fol. 21, 25.

[56] Blancas, Commentarii, p. 536.—The principal of these jurisdictions was the royal audience in which the king himself presided in person. Ibid., p. 355.

[57] Fueros y Observancias, tom. i. fol. 23, 60 et seq., 155, lib. 3, tit. De Manifestationibus Personarum.—Also fol. 137 et seq., tit. 7, De Firmis Juris.—Blancas, Commentarii, pp. 350, 351.—Zurita, Anales, lib. 10, cap. 37.—The first of these processes was styled firma de derecho, the last, manifestation. The Spanish writers are warm in their encomiums of these two provisions. "Quibus duobus praesidiis," says Blancas, "ita nostrae reipublicae status continetur, ut nulla pars communium fortunarum tutelâ vacua relinquatur." Both this author and Zurita have amplified the details respecting them, which the reader may find extracted, and in part translated, by Mr. Hallam, Middle Ages, vol. ii. pp. 75-77, notes.

When complex litigation became more frequent, the Justice was allowed one, afterwards two, and at a still later period, in 1528, five lieutenants, as they were called, who aided him in the discharge of his onerous duties. Martel, Forma de Celebrar Cortes, Notas de Uztarroz, pp. 92-96.—Blancas, Commentarii, pp. 361-366.