{ "id": "permuta-de-las-encomiendas", "type": "entity", "name": "Swapping two encomiendas: the rule that forbade it, the procedure that allowed it, and the editor who added both", "summary": "Ten paragraphs close the chapter on alienating encomiendas by asking whether two holders could exchange theirs. The rule is no: the encomendero owns nothing, the dominion is the king's, his person was chosen for that grant, and an exchange made in fact vacates both. Then comes the machinery that makes it possible — memorial, cause shown, the granting judge, the named successor's consent, confirmation in the Consejo. All ten are the 1736 editor's, not Solórzano's.", "locale": "en", "tags": [ "colonial-law", "colonial-institutions", "encomienda", "law", "law-of-the-indies", "legal-history", "jurisprudence", "textual-criticism", "feudal-law", "canon-law", "indigenous-peoples", "americas", "spanish-empire", "peru", "new-spain", "eighteenth-century", "seventeenth-century", "colonial-administration" ], "relations": [ { "rel": "related", "target": "transaccion-y-particion-de-las-encomiendas" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "indivision-y-legitima-de-las-encomiendas" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "prescripcion-en-las-encomiendas" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "prohibicion-de-enagenar-las-encomiendas" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "dote-y-renunciacion-de-las-encomiendas" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "encomienda" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "solorzano-politica-indiana" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "anadido-de-1736-a-las-cargas-de-las-encomiendas" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "vuelta-de-las-encomiendas-a-la-corona" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "confirmacion-de-las-encomiendas-en-el-consejo-de-indias" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "consejo-de-indias" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "modos-de-acabarse-las-encomiendas" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "cumulacion-de-encomiendas" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "narrativa-y-calidades-de-los-titulos-de-encomienda" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "recopilacion-de-leyes-de-indias" } ], "questions": [ "Could two encomenderos exchange their encomiendas with each other?", "What happened if two encomenderos swapped their grants without permission?", "Who had to approve the exchange of an encomienda?", "Did the person named for the second life have to consent to an exchange?", "Which parts of the Política Indiana were written by its eighteenth-century editor?" ], "claims": [ { "id": "c1", "text": "What this is, and whose words these are. Libro III capítulo XV of the 1736 Madrid impression of the Política Indiana closes with ten numbered paragraphs, §§50 to 59 in continuation of the chapter's own numbering, filling page 310 from the head of the left column to the middle of the right, where capítulo XVI begins. Three things mark them off from the rest of the chapter, and all three were read here on the page. Every one of the ten carries at its head the asterisk this impression uses for editorial matter. Every one carries its authorities inline in the body, where the preceding forty-nine paragraphs carry theirs in lettered footnotes. And §58 closes by citing \"Solorzan. de Iure Ind. tom. 2. lib. 2. c. 14. à n. 57.\" — Solórzano in the third person, as one authority among others. The run is therefore attributed here to the 1736 editor, Francisco Ramiro de Valenzuela, and not to the author.", "sources": [ "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-anadido-cap-xv-permuta" ], "confidence": 0.9 }, { "id": "c2", "text": "The question and the definition. §50: \"Es concerniente à las questiones, que se han tocado en este Capitulo otra, y es, si dos Encomenderos podrán hacer permuta de sus Encomiendas? y como la deben hacer para que subsista? Y comenzando por la difinicion, la permuta es un contrato innominado de buena fee, en el qual ciertas especies se commutan, ò truecan por otras\", from which is born the action praescriptis verbis and with it two suits, one to enforce the bargain and one to rescind it. The definition is taken straight from the Digest and the Code, and the \"ciertas especies\" that are swapped are, in the case at hand, the tribute and service of named Indian towns.", "sources": [ "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-anadido-cap-xv-permuta" ], "confidence": 0.9 }, { "id": "c3", "text": "Who cannot exchange at all. §51: \"Y de aqui se infiere, que para que surta efecto la permutacion, han de tener jus in re los permutantes, y no basta que tengan jus ad rem: y assi el que tiene Cedula para que se le dé la primera vacante, ò para que se les acomode en las vacantes, que huviere no puede tratar de permutas con el que tiene ya Encomienda en possession.\" A royal warrant promising the next vacancy is an expectation and not a thing, and it is not tradeable. The paragraph is incidentally a record of what such warrants were: cédulas held by men waiting for an encomienda to fall in.", "sources": [ "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-anadido-cap-xv-permuta" ], "confidence": 0.9 }, { "id": "c4", "text": "The general rule, and the four reasons packed into one sentence. §52: \"Es regla general, que el Encomendero no puede permutar su Encomienda con otro Encomendero, porque no es Dueño de ella, y solo tiene, como queda dicho, el útil, y fruto de la Encomienda, y el dominio está penes Regem, que la concedió, y fue elegida su persona para aquella Encomienda, en qué pudo haver algunos motivos especiales, y si de hecho permutaren quedarán vacas ambas Encomiendas, como sucede en la permutacion de los Beneficios.\" He is not owner; he holds only the use and fruit; the dominion is the king's; and his person was chosen for that particular grant, for reasons that may have been particular to it. The sanction is that both grants fall vacant. The paragraph adds that CoKier himself holds benefices are not lost ipso iure but must be declared vacant, and that in feuds too there is a penalty of privation for exchanging without the direct lord's consent.", "sources": [ "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-anadido-cap-xv-permuta" ], "confidence": 0.9 }, { "id": "c5", "text": "The fourth reason is the one worth marking, and the entry does not overstate it. That \"fue elegida su persona para aquella Encomienda, en qué pudo haver algunos motivos especiales\" is the only clause in the run that points at anything outside the two holders and the king — the possibility that a particular man was matched to a particular set of towns for a reason. The paragraph does not say what such motives were, does not connect them to the protective charge the chapter's §2 grounds the whole prohibition on, and gives no example. Reading it as a trace of that protective purpose is this corpus's inference and not a statement on the page; the claim is set at 0.85 and no relation edge is drawn on it.", "sources": [ "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-anadido-cap-xv-permuta" ], "confidence": 0.85 }, { "id": "c6", "text": "How the rule opens. §53 distinguishes encomiendas from benefices, \"no obstante se diferencian en muchas cosas, y assi quedará assentado, que estas permutaciones se podrán hacer con intervencion del Superior\". §54 identifies him: \"Que el que dió la Encomienda sea Juez para admitir la permuta, parece llano, pues à quien está concedido lo mas, que es darlas, se concede lo menos, que es autorizar la permuta, si halla bastante causa para ello.\" §55 proves it from the canon law of benefices, where the faculty of exchanging is granted to the Ordinaries. The argument from greater to lesser is the whole of the authority for it; no cédula and no law of the Recopilación is cited in the run.", "sources": [ "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-anadido-cap-xv-permuta" ], "confidence": 0.9 }, { "id": "c7", "text": "The third party who could veto it. §56 distinguishes according to whether the encomienda is held in first life with a successor already named for the second, in which case \"no se puede hacer la permuta por ser en perjuicio de tercero, como queda anotado\". §57 supplies the cure: if the person named for the second life consents, by himself if he is over twenty-five or through his curator if a minor, and the other diligences required in the transactions of minors precede, \"correrá la permuta por lo que mira à los permutantes, y sus successores\". The reason given for differing from entails is that in a mayorazgo the successor is not the only man interested, whereas \"en las Encomiendas fenece en la segunda vida el derecho de succeder\". The protected third party is the named successor; no other third party is contemplated.", "sources": [ "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-anadido-cap-xv-permuta" ], "confidence": 0.9 }, { "id": "c8", "text": "The procedure, stated as a working form. §58: \"Y el modo de practicar esta permuta será que los permutantes presenten Memorial ante el que dio las dos Encomiendas, refiriendo las causas, y motivos, que para permutarlas tienen, y el Juez haviendose informado de ellas, y que son ciertas, y bastantes, les admite la permuta, con tal, que dentro de el termino de la ley traygan confirmacion de su Magestad, y entre tanto cada uno mantenga la suya, hasta que se confirme en el Consejo.\" §59 covers the case of two different grantors: \"Pero si una Encomienda la huviere dado el Virrey, y otra algun Governador sujeto à su Jurisdiccion, bastará acudir al Virrey; pero si no fuere de su Jurisdiccion, será necessario tomar el consentimiento de ambos.\" Four safeguards are stacked: cause shown and verified, the grantor as judge, possession unchanged until confirmation, and confirmation by the king in the Council of the Indies.", "sources": [ "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-anadido-cap-xv-permuta" ], "confidence": 0.9 }, { "id": "c9", "text": "The chapter's own index does not keep step with the run. The printed SUMARIO of capítulo XV, read here in the left column of page 304, carries four heads for this material — 50, \"Si los Encomenderos pueden hacer permuta de sus Encomiendas?\"; 51, \"Y quando? y que debe intervenir autoridad del Principe, y num. 52. y siguientes.\"; 57, \"Si ay segunda vida, debe intervenir el llamado à ella.\"; and 58, \"Modo de practicar la permuta.\" — and it ends there, at head 58, although the body runs to §59. None of the four heads carries the asterisk that every one of the ten body paragraphs carries. The SUMARIO therefore indexes editorial matter without marking it as such, and stops one paragraph short of the chapter's end. Both observations are of the pages read here; the inference that the index was amended less carefully than the text is this corpus's.", "sources": [ "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-anadido-cap-xv-permuta" ], "confidence": 0.85 }, { "id": "c10", "text": "What this entry establishes and what it does not. It establishes that the 1736 edition of the standard treatise on the law of the Indies closes its chapter on alienating encomiendas with ten added paragraphs on exchanging them; that they state a general rule against it, grounded on the holder having only the use and fruit while \"el dominio está penes Regem\" and on his person having been chosen for that particular grant, with both grants falling vacant if it is done in fact; and that they then set out how it could lawfully be done — memorial to the grantor, causes verified, the named successor's consent where a second life had been designated, possession unchanged in the meantime, and confirmation by the king in the Consejo, with the viceroy's consent added where the two grants came from different hands. It establishes nothing about practice: not one exchange applied for, admitted, refused or confirmed is named, no party, no town, no date and no decision of the Consejo. The authority is entirely doctrinal — CoKier, Geminianus, Nicolaus Delphinus, Pacificus, García, Corbulo, Molina and his Additionator, Maldonado and Pardo, none opened here — and the run cites no cédula and no law of the Recopilación, though the editor prints exactly such a citation at the head of the next chapter. The towns are present in the definition of §50 as the \"ciertas especies\" that would be commuted or swapped, and nowhere else: no consent, hearing or interest of theirs is named among the four safeguards the procedure builds.", "sources": [ "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-anadido-cap-xv-permuta" ], "confidence": 0.9 } ], "takeaways": [], "faqs": [], "evidence_tier": "primary", "evidence": { "level": "industry_observation", "source_types": [ "paper" ] }, "moat_flag": false, "winning_edge": "Nothing accessible in English says whether two encomenderos could trade grants, and the ten paragraphs that answer have not been quoted anywhere. They give the rule in a single packed sentence — he is not owner, holds only the use and fruit, \"el dominio está penes Regem\", and \"fue elegida su persona para aquella Encomienda, en qué pudo haver algunos motivos especiales\", both grants falling vacant if it is done anyway — and then the working procedure that made it possible: memorial to the man who gave the grants, causes verified by him, the consent of anyone already named for the second life, possession unchanged meanwhile, and confirmation by the king in the Council of the Indies. The entry also settles an attribution that changes how the passage should be cited, from three marks read on the page: every paragraph carries the asterisk this impression reserves for editorial matter, every one carries its authorities inline where the rest of the chapter uses footnotes, and §58 cites Solórzano himself in the third person. These are the 1736 editor's words, not the author's — and the chapter's own printed SUMARIO indexes them without the asterisk and stops one paragraph short of where they end. The cost is on the record in the same voice: the authority is wholly doctrinal with no cédula and no law of the Recopilación in ten paragraphs, no exchange is named as ever applied for or granted, and the Indian towns appear once, as the \"ciertas especies\" that would be swapped.", "confidence": 0.85, "last_verified": "2026-09-26", "media": [], "x": {}, "canonical_url": "https://hispanic-legacy.com/k/permuta-de-las-encomiendas", "api_url": "https://hispanic-legacy.com/api/k/permuta-de-las-encomiendas.json", "jsonld": { "@context": "https://schema.org", "name": "Swapping two encomiendas: the rule that forbade it, the procedure that allowed it, and the editor who added both", "description": "Ten paragraphs close the chapter on alienating encomiendas by asking whether two holders could exchange theirs. The rule is no: the encomendero owns nothing, the dominion is the king's, his person was chosen for that grant, and an exchange made in fact vacates both. Then comes the machinery that makes it possible — memorial, cause shown, the granting judge, the named successor's consent, confirmation in the Consejo. All ten are the 1736 editor's, not Solórzano's.", "url": "https://hispanic-legacy.com/k/permuta-de-las-encomiendas", "license": "https://spdx.org/licenses/CC-BY-4.0.html", "dateModified": "2026-09-26", "citation": [ { "@type": "CreativeWork", "name": "Política Indiana, libro III, capítulo XV, §§50-59 — the 1736 editor's added run on the exchange of encomiendas: at §50 the question and the definition, 'Es concerniente à las questiones, que se han tocado en este Capitulo otra, y es, si dos Encomenderos podrán hacer permuta de sus Encomiendas? y como la deben hacer para que subsista? Y comenzando por la difinicion, la permuta es un contrato innominado de buena fee, en el qual ciertas especies se commutan, ò truecan por otras', from which is born the action praescriptis verbis and two suits, one to enforce and one to rescind; at §51 that for the exchange to take effect 'han de tener jus in re los permutantes, y no basta que tengan jus ad rem: y assi el que tiene Cedula para que se le dé la primera vacante, ò para que se les acomode en las vacantes, que huviere no puede tratar de permutas con el que tiene ya Encomienda en possession'; at §52 the general rule, 'que el Encomendero no puede permutar su Encomienda con otro Encomendero, porque no es Dueño de ella, y solo tiene, como queda dicho, el útil, y fruto de la Encomienda, y el dominio está penes Regem, que la concedió, y fue elegida su persona para aquella Encomienda, en qué pudo haver algunos motivos especiales, y si de hecho permutaren quedarán vacas ambas Encomiendas', with the feudal penalty of privation for exchanging without the direct lord's consent; at §53 that although encomiendas resemble benefices they differ in many things, so that these exchanges may be made with the intervention of the Superior; at §54 that the one who gave the encomienda is judge to admit the exchange, 'pues à quien está concedido lo mas, que es darlas, se concede lo menos, que es autorizar la permuta, si halla bastante causa para ello'; at §55 the proof from benefices, where the faculty of exchanging is granted to the Ordinaries; at §56 the distinction whether the encomienda is held in first life with a successor named for the second, in which case 'no se puede hacer la permuta por ser en perjuicio de tercero'; at §57 that if the person named for the second life consents, by himself if over twenty-five or by his curator if a minor, and the other diligences required in the transactions of minors precede, 'correrá la permuta por lo que mira à los permutantes, y sus successores', the reason of difference from mayorazgos being that 'en las Encomiendas fenece en la segunda vida el derecho de succeder'; at §58 the manner of practising it, 'que los permutantes presenten Memorial ante el que dio las dos Encomiendas, refiriendo las causas, y motivos, que para permutarlas tienen, y el Juez haviendose informado de ellas, y que son ciertas, y bastantes, les admite la permuta, con tal, que dentro de el termino de la ley traygan confirmacion de su Magestad, y entre tanto cada uno mantenga la suya, hasta que se confirme en el Consejo'; and at §59 the case of two different grantors, 'Pero si una Encomienda la huviere dado el Virrey, y otra algun Governador sujeto à su Jurisdiccion, bastará acudir al Virrey; pero si no fuere de su Jurisdiccion, será necessario tomar el consentimiento de ambos'", "url": "https://books.google.com/books?id=huEykw_YtzYC&pg=PA310" } ], "@type": "Article", "headline": "Swapping two encomiendas: the rule that forbade it, the procedure that allowed it, and the editor who added both" } }