Grupos intermédios ibéricos en la articulación entre lo local y lo curial (siglos XVI-XVII)

Abstract

: The development of bigger financial needs between the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries led the Apostolic See to find alternative income sources through the supervision of spiritual graces and the selling of curial offices. Iberian society was the main demanding market for apostolic bills in Europe. A hole market with its own circuits and middlemen had to be built. This article sustains that this curial market was a specific space of middle groups. First, these individuals assumed the agency of such business. Secondly, these companies answered to the demand of urban mesocracy and rural elites. The article uses two different types of data sources: those who reflect the daily lives of these groups – bills of exchange, notarial deeds, judicial records, correspondence; and those documents produced by the curial apparatus.