{ "id": "libranzas-y-gasto-del-caudal-de-averia", "type": "entity", "name": "Nothing leaves the chest without a reason written down: the convoy levy's spending rule requires a prior resolution stating the need, a priced estimate, a signed warrant, a receipt from the payee and the vouchers travelling with the warrant — and shuts the admirals of the fleets out of the fund — libro VIIII título VIIII, leyes xxx to xxxv", "summary": "Six laws of the Recopilación de Leyes de Indias govern how money left the chest of the avería, the levy that paid for the convoys of the Indies trade. No sum comes out without a recorded resolution of the Casa de Contratación stating need and cause, a priced estimate, a signed warrant and a receipt; the generals of the armadas may not draw on the fund at all; and arrears and any payment above two hundred thousand maravedís need a special order of the Council.", "locale": "en", "tags": [ "colonial-institutions", "colonial-law", "law-of-the-indies", "legislation", "legal-history", "recopilacion", "casa-de-contratacion", "public-finance", "taxation", "fiscal-history", "accountability", "record-keeping", "real-hacienda", "military", "navigation", "trade", "carrera-de-indias", "seville", "spanish-empire", "americas", "institutions", "seventeenth-century" ], "relations": [ { "rel": "related", "target": "recopilacion-de-leyes-de-indias" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "casa-de-contratacion" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "contribucion-y-tanteo-del-derecho-de-averia" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "receptor-y-arca-del-derecho-de-averia" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "jurisdiccion-y-comiso-del-derecho-de-averia" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "exenciones-y-privilegios-del-derecho-de-averia" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "administracion-y-arca-de-tres-llaves-de-la-averia" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "indultos-y-aumentos-del-caudal-de-averia" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "gastos-y-relaciones-del-derecho-de-averia" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "forma-y-prelacion-de-las-libranzas-de-las-indias" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "pagador-de-las-armadas-y-flotas" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "flotas-y-galeones-de-la-carrera-de-indias" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "consejo-de-indias" } ], "questions": [ "How was money drawn out of the Spanish convoy levy's treasury?", "What was a libranza and what had to accompany it in the Laws of the Indies?", "Could the admirals of the Spanish treasure fleets spend the convoy fund?", "What spending limit required the Council of the Indies to approve a payment?", "How did the Casa de Contratación document purchases made outside Seville?" ], "claims": [ { "id": "c1", "text": "These six laws stand in the Recopilación's título on the contribution and collection of the avería and together they are its law of disbursement. In the fourth impression printed at Madrid in 1791 by the widow of Joaquín Ibarra for the Royal and Supreme Council of the Indies, they run from the rubric of ley xxx in the right-hand column of the printed folio 115 to the close of ley xxxv in the left-hand column of folio 117, where the rubric of ley xxxvj follows. The rubric and margin of ley xxxv stand at the foot of the right-hand column of folio 116 and its body begins at the head of the left-hand column of folio 117. The running head of folio 116 reads \"Libro VIIII. Título VIIII.\" and that of folios 115 and 117 \"De la Contribucion de Averías.\"", "sources": [ "recopilacion-1791-libro-ix-titulo-ix-libranzas-y-gasto" ], "confidence": 0.9 }, { "id": "c2", "text": "The governing law makes a documented decision the condition of opening the chest at all. Ley xxx, from ordinance 17 of 1587 and ordinance 7 of the avería of 1607, orders that from the three-keyed chest \"no se pueda sacar ninguna cantidad de dinero sin preceder acuerdo del Presidente, y Jueces Oficiales de la Casa de Contratacion de Sevilla, y constar de la necesidad, y causa por que se ha de sacar\". Where the money is for provisioning an armada the same law adds a priced estimate: the tribunal is to inform itself of prices and assess the sum needed, \"é informándose de los precios, y tasando la cantidad que fuere menester\".", "sources": [ "recopilacion-1791-libro-ix-titulo-ix-libranzas-y-gasto" ], "confidence": 0.9 }, { "id": "c3", "text": "The chain then runs from the resolution to the payee and back to the account. In conformity with the resolution the President and judges-official issue a warrant signed by them, \"por la qual paguen los que tuvieren las llaves la cantidad librada á quien la haya de haber, tomando carta de pago\"; and ley xxx closes with the sanction that makes the sequence binding, \"y de otra forma no se pase en cuenta\" — money paid out otherwise is simply disallowed in the officer's account. Ley xxxiiij, from Philip II at the Bosque de Segovia on 17 July 1573, completes the paper trail by requiring the vouchers to travel with the warrant: \"vayan con las libranzas los testimonios, y recaudos con que se hubieren justificado\", as is already practised for warrants on the Casa's own treasurer, \"y no se despachen de otra forma\".", "sources": [ "recopilacion-1791-libro-ix-titulo-ix-libranzas-y-gasto" ], "confidence": 0.9 }, { "id": "c4", "text": "One law applies the same rule to a cost that is easy to leave undocumented. Ley xxxj, from ordinance 23 of 1573, charges on the avería the carriage of everything bought for the armadas and fleets \"hasta que se pongan en los Navíos, y entreguen á los Maestres\", requires the receiver to take receipts, and provides that when the fleet has been provisioned the tribunal give him a warrant so the expenditure passes in his account, \"y con ella, y los recibos se le haga bueno, y no de otra forma\". The fund pays the cartage, and the cartage is evidenced like everything else.", "sources": [ "recopilacion-1791-libro-ix-titulo-ix-libranzas-y-gasto" ], "confidence": 0.9 }, { "id": "c5", "text": "The most striking of the six keeps the fleet's own commanders away from the money. Ley xxxij, from ordinance 11 of the averías of 1607 and an order at Madrid of 24 March 1621, gathered into the compilation under Charles II, orders flatly that \"los Generales de las Armadas, y Flotas no libren en la hacienda de la Avería\". What is appropriated to the captaincy general and to the wages of the sea and war people and officers is to be handed to the paymaster of the armada or fleet, \"y allí puedan librar los Generales, hasta en la cantidad separada\". The commander may draw on a separated sum already in another officer's hands, and never on the fund itself.", "sources": [ "recopilacion-1791-libro-ix-titulo-ix-libranzas-y-gasto" ], "confidence": 0.9 }, { "id": "c6", "text": "The same law makes one exception and immediately attaches a check to it. The generals may draw in the Indies and on the voyage for the unavoidable expenses of the captaincy general, \"que fueren inexcusables\", of which \"tomarán la razon nuestros Oficiales de Armada, y Flotas\"; and when the voyage is over, \"dén cuenta con pago los Contadores de Avería\". The distance that made the prohibition impracticable is met by having the fleet's own treasury officers record the drafts as they are made and by a final accounting at home.", "sources": [ "recopilacion-1791-libro-ix-titulo-ix-libranzas-y-gasto" ], "confidence": 0.85 }, { "id": "c7", "text": "Ley xxxiij fixes a money ceiling and an absolute bar, and defines the term it uses. From ordinance 10 of the avería of 1607 and an order at Madrid of 24 December 1608 sent by letter of the Council, it provides that no back debt of the avería, and no other debt of it exceeding two hundred thousand maravedís, is to be paid \"sin dar primero cuenta á nuestro Consejo de Indias, y tener su órden especial\", and then defines a back debt as one \"que se causó, y no pagó de un viage en otro\". The same law forbids the treasurer to make set-offs against other debts without an order and a warrant, and forbids the administrators to consume money appropriated to one purpose on any other, \"y sobre todo se guarden las órdenes del Consejo\".", "sources": [ "recopilacion-1791-libro-ix-titulo-ix-libranzas-y-gasto" ], "confidence": 0.9 }, { "id": "c8", "text": "The last law of the block handles the case the system was least able to document, a purchase made away from Seville. Ley xxxv, from ordinance 19 of 1576, allows the tribunal to issue the receiver an advance on account, \"á buena cuenta la cantidad de maravedís que les pareciere es menester\", where neither the Casa's factor nor the people who come to collect payment can be found at the place of purchase. The factor or his attorney then buys \"con asistencia del Veedor de la Armada\", the receiver pays what the tribunal resolved should be bought, and only afterwards, \"visto por ellos\", is a warrant in form issued so that what was justly paid passes in account, \"y no en otra forma\". The advance is a provisional act regularised by the same documents as every other payment.", "sources": [ "recopilacion-1791-libro-ix-titulo-ix-libranzas-y-gasto" ], "confidence": 0.85 }, { "id": "c9", "text": "What a flattering reading of these six laws would leave out, and the leaves do not. The whole apparatus is addressed to the officers who hold the money, not to the shippers who paid it: no payer is given sight of a resolution, a priced estimate or an account, and nothing in the block gives him a complaint. The resolution, the warrant and the allowance in account are all acts of the same tribunal, so the body that decides the need also signs the warrant and afterwards passes it. Ley xxxij's prohibition on the generals is dated twice, 1607 and 1621, and gathered again under Charles II, which is evidence that commanders had been drawing on the fund. The ceiling of ley xxxiij protects the Council's control rather than the payer's purse, and the advance of ley xxxv concedes that the controls could not reach a purchase made out of sight.", "sources": [ "recopilacion-1791-libro-ix-titulo-ix-libranzas-y-gasto" ], "confidence": 0.8 }, { "id": "c10", "text": "What this entry does not establish. It reads six laws of one título in one impression. It says nothing about whether any warrant was refused for want of a resolution, whether any payment was disallowed in an account, whether any general drew on the fund in breach of ley xxxij, how often the Council was asked for the special order of ley xxxiij or whether it was given, what the fund actually spent in any year, or how the two hundred thousand maravedí ceiling compared with the cost of a fleet. The ordinances of the Casa and of the avería of 1573, 1576, 1587 and 1607 cited in these margins are not in this código and were not read. The laws of the preceding título on what the fund could be spent on and on the returns rendered to the Council are a different block of leaves and are read elsewhere in this corpus, not here.", "sources": [ "recopilacion-1791-libro-ix-titulo-ix-libranzas-y-gasto" ], "confidence": 0.9 } ], "takeaways": [], "faqs": [], "evidence_tier": "primary", "evidence": { "level": "industry_observation", "source_types": [ "paper" ] }, "moat_flag": true, "winning_edge": "This entry reads the six laws of the Recopilación that govern how money left the chest of the convoy levy, and what it adds is below the resolution of a summary of the código: a prior resolution of the Casa that must state the need and the cause before a coin moves; a priced estimate taken from the market where the purchase is for an armada; a warrant signed by the President and judges-official that the keyholders, not the receiver, execute; a receipt from the payee; the vouchers of justification required to travel with the warrant itself; and the single sanction that holds the chain together, \"y de otra forma no se pase en cuenta\". It sets beside them the two laws that bound the fund from outside — a flat bar on the generals of the armadas drawing on it, with their unavoidable overseas drafts recorded by the fleet's own officers and accounted for on return, and a ceiling of two hundred thousand maravedís, with arrears defined as a debt carried from one voyage to the next, above which only a special order of the Council of the Indies will do. It prints beside them what the same laws concede: that the tribunal that resolves the need also signs the warrant and afterwards passes it, that no payer is given sight of any of it, and that the prohibition on the generals had to be issued in 1607, again in 1621 and again in the compilation.", "confidence": 0.85, "last_verified": "2026-11-01", "media": [], "x": {}, "canonical_url": "https://hispanic-legacy.com/k/libranzas-y-gasto-del-caudal-de-averia", "api_url": "https://hispanic-legacy.com/api/k/libranzas-y-gasto-del-caudal-de-averia.json", "jsonld": { "@context": "https://schema.org", "name": "Nothing leaves the chest without a reason written down: the convoy levy's spending rule requires a prior resolution stating the need, a priced estimate, a signed warrant, a receipt from the payee and the vouchers travelling with the warrant — and shuts the admirals of the fleets out of the fund — libro VIIII título VIIII, leyes xxx to xxxv", "description": "Six laws of the Recopilación de Leyes de Indias govern how money left the chest of the avería, the levy that paid for the convoys of the Indies trade. No sum comes out without a recorded resolution of the Casa de Contratación stating need and cause, a priced estimate, a signed warrant and a receipt; the generals of the armadas may not draw on the fund at all; and arrears and any payment above two hundred thousand maravedís need a special order of the Council.", "url": "https://hispanic-legacy.com/k/libranzas-y-gasto-del-caudal-de-averia", "license": "https://spdx.org/licenses/CC-BY-4.0.html", "dateModified": "2026-11-01", "citation": [ { "@type": "CreativeWork", "name": "Recopilación de leyes de los reynos de las Indias, libro VIIII título VIIII \"DE LA CONTRIBUCION, ADMINISTRACION, y cobranza del derecho de Avería\" — leyes xxx, xxxj, xxxij, xxxiij, xxxiiij and xxxv, the six laws that govern how money left the chest of the convoy levy: no sum out of the three-keyed chest without a prior resolution of the President and Judges of the Casa stating the need and the cause, a priced estimate where the purchase is for the armada, a warrant signed by them and a receipt taken from the payee, on pain of the sum not passing in account; the carriage of everything bought for the fleets charged on the fund until it is aboard and delivered to the masters; the generals of the armadas and fleets forbidden to draw on the fund at all and sent to the paymaster for the separated sum; a ceiling of two hundred thousand maravedís and an absolute bar on arrears without a special order of the Council of the Indies, with set-offs forbidden to the treasurer and money appropriated to one purpose forbidden to be spent on another; the vouchers of justification to travel with every warrant; and, for purchases away from Seville, an advance on account to the receiver settled afterwards by a warrant in form. The laws read here run from the rubric of ley xxx in the right-hand column of the printed folio 115 to the close of ley xxxv in the left-hand column of folio 117, where the rubric of ley xxxvj follows; the rubric and margin of ley xxxv stand at the foot of the right-hand column of folio 116 and its body begins at the head of the left-hand column of folio 117. The running head of folio 116 reads \"Libro VIIII. Título VIIII.\" and that of folios 115 and 117 \"De la Contribucion de Averías.\" Ley xxx, rubric \"Que no se dé libranza de Avería sin acuerdo del Presidente, y Jueces Oficiales, y sin ella, y carta de pago, no se pase en cuenta.\", margin \"El mismo Ordenanza 17. de 1587. D. Felipe III en la 7. de Avería de 1607.\", whose text reads \"ORdenamos y mandamos, que del Arca de tres llaves del caudal de Avería no se pueda sacar ninguna cantidad de dinero sin preceder acuerdo del Presidente, y Jueces Oficiales de la Casa de Contratacion de Sevilla, y constar de la necesidad, y causa por que se ha de sacar; y habiendo de ser para compra de cosas necesarias á la provision de Armada, é informándose de los precios, y tasando la cantidad que fuere menester, y conforme á este Acuerdo darán libranza, firmada del Presidente, y Jueces Oficiales, por la qual paguen los que tuvieren las llaves la cantidad librada á quien la haya de haber, tomando carta de pago, y de otra forma no se pase en cuenta.\" Ley xxxj, rubric \"Que los gastos de acarreos de las cosas que se compraren por la Avería, se paguen por libranza de la Casa.\", margin \"D. Felipe II Ordenanza 23. de 1573.\", whose text reads \"EL Presidente, y Jueces Oficiales de la Casa de Sevilla libren de la Avería los gastos de acarreos de todas las cosas que se compraren para las Armadas, y Flotas, hasta que se pongan en los Navíos, y entreguen á los Maestres, y el Receptor tome cartas de pago; y habiendo acabado de proveer la Armada, y Flota, el Presidente, y Jueces le dén libranza, para que se le pase en cuenta, y con ella, y los recibos se le haga bueno, y no de otra forma.\" Ley xxxij, rubric \"Que los Generales no libren en la hacienda de la Avería, sino en los casos de esta ley.\", margin \"D. Felipe III Ordenanza 11. de Averías de 1607. En Madrid á 24 de Marzo de 1621. D. Cárlos II en esta Recopilacion.\", whose text reads \"MAndamos que los Generales de las Armadas, y Flotas no libren en la hacienda de la Avería; y lo que se aplicare á Capitanía General, y sueldos de la gente de Mar, y Guerra, y Oficiales, se entregue al Pagador de la Armada, ó Flota, y allí puedan librar los Generales, hasta en la cantidad separada; y asímismo puedan librar en las Indias, y viage los gastos de Capitanía General, que fueren inexcusables, de que tomarán la razon nuestros Oficiales de Armada, y Flotas; y acabado, dén cuenta con pago los Contadores de Avería.\" Ley xxxiij, rubric \"Que sin órden del Consejo no se pague deuda atrasada, ni otra que pase de docientos mil maravedís, y como se harán los rescuentros.\", margin \"D. Felipe III Ordenanza 10. de Avería de 1607. En Madrid á 24 de Diciembre de 1608. Por carta del Consejo.\", whose text reads \"NO se ha de pagar deuda atrasada, ni otra ninguna de Avería que pase de docientos mil maravedís, sin dar primero cuenta á nuestro Consejo de Indias, y tener su órden especial, y entiéndase deuda atrasada la que se causó, y no pagó de un viage en otro; y el Tesorero no pueda hacer rescuentros de otras deudas de ella sin órden, y libranza del Presidente, y Jueces Oficiales de la Casa; y los que administraren no consuman el dinero separado, y aplicado para una cosa, en otra ninguna, y sobre todo se guarden las órdenes del Consejo.\" Ley xxxiiij, rubric \"Que en las libranzas vayan los recaudos de su justificacion.\", margin \"D. Felipe II en el Bosque de Segovia á 17 de Julio de 1573.\", whose text reads \"QUando el Presidente, y Jueces Oficiales de la Casa libraren algunas cantidades en el Receptor de la Avería, vayan con las libranzas los testimonios, y recaudos con que se hubieren justificado, como se practica en las que dan en el Tesorero de la Casa, y no se despachen de otra forma.\" Ley xxxv, rubric \"Que para las compras fuera de Sevilla se libre al Receptor lo necesario, y con fe de la paga se le dé libranza en forma.\", margin \"El mismo Ordenanza 19. de 1576.\", whose text reads \"PARA las compras que se hubieren de hacer por cuenta de la Avería fuera de Sevilla, donde no se pudiere hallar el Factor de la Casa, ni las personas que vinieren á recibir la paga del Receptor, el Presidente, y Jueces Oficiales libren al Receptor á buena cuenta la cantidad de maravedís que les pareciere es menester; y habiendo comprado el Factor, ó el que tuviere su poder, con asistencia del Veedor de la Armada, pague el Receptor lo que estuviere acordado por el Presidente, y Jueces Oficiales, que se compre; y visto por ellos, le dén libranza para que se le pase en cuenta lo que justamente hubiere pagado, y con esta libranza, y las demas cartas de pago, se le reciba, y pase en cuenta, y no en otra forma.\"", "url": "https://books.google.com/books?id=t5EbF6Y1EM4C&pg=PA116" } ], "@type": "Article", "headline": "Nothing leaves the chest without a reason written down: the convoy levy's spending rule requires a prior resolution stating the need, a priced estimate, a signed warrant, a receipt from the payee and the vouchers travelling with the warrant — and shuts the admirals of the fleets out of the fund — libro VIIII título VIIII, leyes xxx to xxxv" } }