The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume 52, 1841-1898: Explorations by early navigators, descriptions of the islands and their peoples, their history and records of the catholic missions, as related in contemporaneous books and manuscripts, showing the political, economic, commercial and religious conditions of those islands from their earliest relations with European nations to the close of the nineteenth century
History
The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume 52, 1841-1898: Explorations by early navigators, descriptions of the islands and their peoples, their history and records of the catholic missions, as related in contemporaneous books and manuscripts, showing the political, economic, commercial and religious conditions of those islands from their earliest relations with European nations to the close of the nineteenth century
Demarcation line of Alexander VI; Missions -- Philippines; Philippines -- Discovery and exploration; Philippines -- History -- Sources
P. 255, lines 3-5 from end: Up to the beginning of the sixteenth
century, Toledo was the chief city in Spain in manufacturing silk;
it has been estimated that this industry gave employment there
to at least 100,000 people. Gaspar Naranjo, "who traveled through
España late in the seventeenth century, asserts that, according to
his knowledge, in 1480 Toledo consumed 450,000 libras of silk, which
could furnish the supply for 15,000 looms. Although this number was
greatly lessened when the Escorial was completed, yet from the looms
of Toledo proceeded the richest silks for church adornments, ribbons,
and hangings. In the year 1651 Toledo still counted 5,000 looms in
operation, although not all within the city; a little afterward, there
were not more than two thousand; in 1714 they were reduced to seventy,
and finally to none at all. When the remnants of this manufacture
left Toledo, that of Valencia gained strength, but never to the
extent which might have been if legislation had permitted it. The
Moors had left that of Granada in the best condition; years after
the conquest it maintained 5,000 spinning-wheels, and the kingdom
yielded a million libras of good silk; but just at this point began
the exactions of the revenue officials, and likewise, in consequence,
the decadence of this industry. It was declared subject to the payment
of alçabala, which was a tax of fourteen per cent when once the tenth
was applied as an ecclesiastical income; eight maravedís besides
were charged to it for the impost called tortil [i.e., spiral?],
and nine maravedís more for a municipal tax. When with the increase
from successive impositions the management of this revenue became
too complicated, all these duties were combined in one; and then it
was seen that every libra of silk paid, as its share of the taxes,
the enormous amount of very nearly fifteen and one-half reals. With
the increase in taxes, the production steadily diminished; by 1643,
that of Granada had decreased from a million to one-fourth of that
amount, and not long afterward to 80,000, and even less. The silk
industry, thus burdened, had to compete with that of Genoa, whence
large shipments of silk goods were freely imported into Spanish
ports, and sold at lower prices than the goods made in España; and
a mortal blow was dealt to it when the exportation of Spanish silks
was prohibited, and sumptuary laws reserved the use of silk fabrics
to a few classes. It is astonishing that this industry has been able
to survive up to the present epoch, although it is in a languishing
condition." (Arias y Miranda, Examen crítico-histórico, pp. 154, 155.)
P. 267, note 78, line 7 from end: For "p. 278" read "p. 279."
P. 286, note 87: The document here mentioned was afterward shifted
to another place; the reference should be to VOL. XLVII, p. 119,
paragraph 1 of note.
VOLUME XLV
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