Medieval Writings on Secular Women by Medieval Writings on Secular Women (Penguin Classics)

Author:Medieval Writings on Secular Women (Penguin Classics) [Retail]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780141968698
Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd
Published: 2011-02-14T16:00:00+00:00

62. A Wife Defends the Property Rights of herself and her Husband, Barcelona, 17 October 987

This document is written against the background of the aftermath of Al-Mansur’s sacking of Barcelona in 985. Such disruption was often used as a pretext to claim property, whether or not rightfully, and court cases frequently increased in its wake.

Newly translated from: Àngel Fabreca i Grau, ed., Diplomatari de la Catedral de Barcelona Documents dels anys 844–1260, Volum 1: Documents dels anys 844–1000 (Barcelona: Capitol Catedral de Barcelona, 1995), no. 172.

In the year of our Lord, 986 [sic], in the thirty-first year of the reign of Lothar, on the Kalends of July, fourth feast day, Barcelona was besieged by the Saracens and, God permitting it through the impediment of our sins, it was captured in the same month on the second of the nones, and all the inhabitants of that city and its county, who had entered the city by the order of Count Borrell to guard and defend it, were either killed or captured; and there perished all their substance, whatever they had brought with them, including books and royal decrees and all their charters, however they had been drawn up, through which they held all their allodial land [i.e. land free of obligations to a lord] and possessions among themselves and from their relatives up to two hundred years and more previously.

Among these were lost the charters of a certain man, named Adam, and of his wife, named Dulcidia. And so the aforementioned Dulcidia came and sought advice from Judge Aurutio as to what she could do about these charters; and the above-mentioned judge asked whether she could bring witnesses who could say they had heard or seen these charters; and the aforementioned woman produced witnesses who had heard and seen them, who were: Daniel, Bellido and Pasquale. [There follows a list of fifteen documents, including a sale to the couple by a Jew, which the witnesses testify about.] And to this, we, the above-mentioned witnesses, swear, first by God, the Almighty Father, and by Jesus Christ, His son, and by the Holy Spirit, who in this Trinity is the one and true God, and [they swear] by the place of veneration of St Clement, the martyr of our Lord, whose church is situated in the suburb of Barcelona, in the street of St Mary which is to the west, above whose sacrosanct altar in this foundation we placed our hands and touched it as we swore; [we swore] that we, the above-mentioned, heard the above charters read out, and saw others of them written down, and by these charters the above-mentioned Adam and his wife hold allodial land firmly and undisturbed; that on the day of Barcelona’s submersion these charters were lost there, and today, according to the law, the same text which was in those above-mentioned charters is renewed, and we testify that to our knowledge it is done so rightly and truly, and we swear by the above oath in the Lord.

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