Geographical distribution of the notary offices in the ancient kingdom of Seville during the XVIth Century

Abstract

This paper contributes to the knowledge of public notaries in rural areas during the Early Modern period through the study of the geographical distribution of the notary offices in the villages under the jurisdiction of the city of Seville during the XVIth century. Our starting point is an interesting document, made by the city council of Seville during negotiations with the Royal Treasury, which contains a detailed list of all notaries of the towns and villages of the district of Seville and the value they are priced. Using a quantitative perspective, it is being calculated the number of notaries working in the different villages and the value allocated to them, pooling these results with the social and economic reality of the ancient Kingdom of Seville in order to determine the existence of a direct correlation between the political, social and economic development of a village and the number and value of the notary offices who worked in it.