{
  "id": "tributo-de-los-negros-y-mulatos-libres",
  "type": "entity",
  "name": "The tribute of free blacks and mulattoes in the Laws of the Indies, and the residence rule built to collect it",
  "summary": "Libro VII, título V of the Recopilación de Leyes de Indias opens with four laws taxing free black and mulatto households at a mark of silver a year. The levy is graduated by means and remitted for the poor and for the old, the children and the women with no house or property; the laws after it bind the payers to live with known masters under a district register, and send the unemployed to the mines. Read from the 1791 fourth impression, folios 360-361.",
  "locale": "en",
  "tags": [
    "colonial-law",
    "law-of-the-indies",
    "legislation",
    "legal-history",
    "slavery",
    "afro-descendant",
    "taxation",
    "tribute",
    "spanish-empire",
    "americas",
    "sixteenth-century",
    "seventeenth-century",
    "recopilacion",
    "governance",
    "administration"
  ],
  "relations": [
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "recopilacion-de-leyes-de-indias"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "proclamacion-de-libertad-ante-las-audiencias"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "morenos-libres-y-rancheadores-en-la-recopilacion"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "tributos-y-tasas-de-los-indios"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "tributo-en-dinero-o-en-frutos"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "retasa-y-revisita-de-los-tributos-de-indios"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "limites-de-la-tasa-y-castigo-del-exceso"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "mestizos-en-el-derecho-indiano"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "nombres-de-las-generaciones-nuevas-del-peru"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "republica-de-indios"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "casas-de-moneda-de-las-indias"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "coartacion"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "empires-slavery-and-coercion-compared"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "sangleyes-de-filipinas"
    }
  ],
  "questions": [
    "Did free black people pay tribute in the Spanish Indies?",
    "How much was the tribute of free blacks and mulattoes in Spanish America?",
    "Why did Spanish law make free blacks live with a known master?",
    "Did the children of African men and Indian women pay tribute?",
    "What is libro VII título V of the Recopilación de Leyes de Indias?"
  ],
  "claims": [
    {
      "id": "c1",
      "text": "The Spanish code of the Indies gives free people of African descent a título of their own, and its first four laws are about money. In the fourth impression, printed at Madrid in 1791 by the widow of Joaquín Ibarra for the Royal and Supreme Council of the Indies, libro VII opens título V at folio 360 under the heading \"TÍTULO QUINTO. DE LOS MULATOS, NEGROS, BERBERISCOS, é hijos de Indios.\" The folio is fixed by the volume's own índice of libros IIII to VIII, which gives \"Título 5. De los Mulatos, Negros, Berberiscos, é hijos de Indios. fol. 360\", rather than by the running heads, which on this leaf still carry the previous título. Leyes j to iiij run from that heading across folio 361, each printed beside a margin naming the monarch, place and date of every order it consolidates.",
      "sources": [
        "recopilacion-1791-libro-vii-titulo-v-tributo"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    },
    {
      "id": "c2",
      "text": "The opening law states a rate and states the crown's reasons for charging it, and the reasons are worth reading because they are circular. Ley j, \"Que los Negros, y Negras, Mulatos, y Mulatas, libres, paguen tributo al Rey\" (margin \"D. Felipe II en Madrid á 27 de Abril de 1574. A 5 de Agosto de 1577. En Burgos á 21 de Octubre de 1592\"), recites that many enslaved people who came to the Indies and others born there \"han adquirido libertad, y tienen grangerías, y hacienda\", and that for living in the king's dominions, being maintained \"en paz, y justicia\", for having been slaves and finding themselves free, and because blacks were accustomed to pay tribute \"en sus naturalezas\" in large amount, \"tenemos justo derecho para que nos le paguen, y que este sea un marco de plata en cada un año, mas, ó ménos, conforme á las tierras donde vivieren\". Freedom itself, and the prior fact of having been enslaved, are among the grounds the law gives for the charge.",
      "sources": [
        "recopilacion-1791-libro-vii-titulo-v-tributo"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    },
    {
      "id": "c3",
      "text": "The same law refuses a flat levy and writes exemptions into the statute, which is the clause general accounts of this tribute leave out. Ley j closes: \"Y porque este repartimiento no podrá ser igual, sino conforme á la hacienda de cada uno, de que habrán de ser libres los pobres, y en el personal los viejos, niños, y mugeres, que no tuvieren casa, ni hacienda, proveerán las Audiencias lo que fuere justicia conforme á derecho.\" The apportionment is to follow each person's property; the poor are to be free of it; and in the personal tribute the old, the children and women with neither house nor property are exempt, with the audiencias to provide what justice requires. The same sentence that concedes the exemptions leaves their application to the courts rather than fixing them, and nothing on these leaves sets a threshold.",
      "sources": [
        "recopilacion-1791-libro-vii-titulo-v-tributo"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    },
    {
      "id": "c4",
      "text": "The law also settles who collects and where the money goes, and its assessors are the senior courts rather than the local treasury. Ley j orders viceroys, presidents, audiencias and governors to apportion within their districts the amount that seems fit \"y con que buenamente nos puedan servir por sus personas, haciendas, y grangerías en cada un año\", then to report the apportionment to the royal officials of the province, who are to collect it \"como hacienda nuestra\" and put it in the Caxa Real, taking charge of the sum and being given every necessary assistance. A mark of silver is the standard Castilian weight of eight ounces, and this corpus does not convert it here to a figure in reales or pesos: the law itself makes the rate variable \"conforme á las tierras donde vivieren\" and the leaves read supply no conversion.",
      "sources": [
        "recopilacion-1791-libro-vii-titulo-v-tributo"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    },
    {
      "id": "c5",
      "text": "The second law extends the charge by descent and does it by resolving a doubt against the payers. Ley ij, \"Que los hijos de Negros libres, ó esclavos, habidos en matrimonio con Indias, deben tributar\" (margin \"D. Felipe II á 18 de Mayo de 1572. Y á 28 de Mayo de 1573\"), reads in full: \"HASE dudado si los hijos de Negros libres, ó esclavos, habidos en matrimonio con Indias, son exêntos de pagar el tributo personal, sin embargo de que alegan, que no son Indios, y há parecido, que estos son obligados á tributar como los Indios, y que las Audiencias provean, que así se haga.\" The law records that the children of such marriages were arguing in their own defence \"que no son Indios\" — that is, that they fell outside the category the personal tribute was built for — and it answers that they must pay as Indians do. The argument is preserved in the statute that overrules it.",
      "sources": [
        "recopilacion-1791-libro-vii-titulo-v-tributo"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    },
    {
      "id": "c6",
      "text": "The third law is the one that turns a tax into a regime of residence, and the code states the fiscal motive openly. Ley iij, \"Que los Mulatos, y Negros libres vivan con amos conocidos, para que se puedan cobrar sus tributos\" (margin \"El mismo en S. Martin de la Vega á 29 de Abril de 1577\"), opens \"HAY dificultad en cobrar los tributos de Negros, y Mulatos libres, por ser gente que no tiene asiento, ni lugar cierto\", and from that difficulty derives an obligation \"á que vivan con amos conocidos\", a bar on leaving one master for another without licence of the ordinary justice, a register in every district \"con expresion de sus nombres, y personas con quien viven\", and a duty on masters to pay the tribute out of the wage they give for the service. A free person's liability to a tax is made the reason for attaching them to a named employer and enrolling them by name.",
      "sources": [
        "recopilacion-1791-libro-vii-titulo-v-tributo"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    },
    {
      "id": "c7",
      "text": "The enforcement clause of the same law is coercive in terms, and it is printed without qualification. Ley iij ends by ordering masters, if those living with them absent themselves, to give notice at once to the justice, \"para que en qualquier parte donde fueren hallados, sean presos, y vueltos á sus amos con prisiones, y apremiados á vivir, de forma que haya cuenta, y razon\", with viceroys and justices commanded to order and provide accordingly. Arrest, return in irons and compulsion to live under account are applied here to people the same título calls free; nothing on the leaf distinguishes this procedure from the one used for fugitives from slavery, except that the person recovered is returned to a master who is an employer rather than an owner.",
      "sources": [
        "recopilacion-1791-libro-vii-titulo-v-tributo"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    },
    {
      "id": "c8",
      "text": "The fourth law sends the unemployed to the mines and makes their labour a source of royal revenue. Ley iiij, \"Que los Negros, y Mulatos libres trabajen en las minas, y sean condenados á ellas por los delitos que cometieren\" (margin \"D. Felipe III en Valladolid á 29 de Noviembre de 1602\"), orders viceroys and ministers to see that free blacks and mulattoes \"y ociosos, que no tuvieren oficios, se ocupen, y trabajen en la labor de las minas\", that those condemned for crimes to some service be condemned to this one, and that beyond food and clothing whatever the miners pay for the service and labour of those so condemned \"se cobre, y aplique á nuestra Real hacienda\". Having no trade is treated as a condition correctable by assignment to mine work, and the proceeds of the convicts' labour are assigned to the treasury rather than to the worker.",
      "sources": [
        "recopilacion-1791-libro-vii-titulo-v-tributo"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    },
    {
      "id": "c9",
      "text": "Read as a block, the four laws are a fiscal argument with an administrative apparatus attached, and the apparatus is what gives the block its character. Ley j sets a graduated charge with exemptions; ley ij widens the class of payers by descent; ley iij binds the payers to a named master, a district register and recovery in irons to make the charge collectable; ley iiij disposes of those outside any master's household by sending them to the mines. This corpus reads the sequence as one movement from a tax to a status, with the fiscal difficulty stated in ley iij as the hinge; that reading is this corpus's and not a statement on the leaf, since no law of the four cites another.",
      "sources": [
        "recopilacion-1791-libro-vii-titulo-v-tributo"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.85
    },
    {
      "id": "c10",
      "text": "What this entry establishes is the text of four printed laws in the 1791 fourth impression, read from the leaves themselves; it does not establish that the mark of silver was ever collected at that rate, that any audiencia ever exempted a poor or elderly payer under ley j, that any district register under ley iij was compiled, or that anyone was taken to the mines under ley iiij. No treasury account, padrón or audiencia ruling was opened for this entry and this corpus holds none; those are the records that would turn these laws into evidence of practice. Nothing here was collated against the 1681 first impression, which this corpus also holds, nor against any archival original of the cédulas the margins cite. Leyes v to viij of the same título are carried by proclamacion-de-libertad-ante-las-audiencias and leyes x to xxj by morenos-libres-y-rancheadores-en-la-recopilacion; ley viiij and leyes xxij to the end of the título at folio 369 are carried by no object in this corpus.",
      "sources": [
        "recopilacion-1791-libro-vii-titulo-v-tributo"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    }
  ],
  "takeaways": [],
  "faqs": [],
  "evidence_tier": "primary",
  "evidence": {
    "level": "industry_observation",
    "source_types": [
      "paper"
    ]
  },
  "moat_flag": true,
  "winning_edge": "That free blacks and mulattoes paid tribute in Spanish America is stated in most surveys of colonial society in a single sentence and almost never quoted. This entry prints the four laws that impose it from the leaves of the 1791 fourth impression and supplies the clauses that the sentence omits in both directions. On one side: that ley j refuses a flat levy, orders the charge apportioned \"conforme á la hacienda de cada uno\", exempts the poor outright and exempts from the personal tribute \"los viejos, niños, y mugeres, que no tuvieren casa, ni hacienda\" — a graduated tax with written exemptions, assessed by the audiencias, in 1574. On the other, and in the same breath: that the crown's stated ground for the charge includes having been enslaved and now being free; that ley ij answers the payers' own recorded argument \"que no son Indios\" by making them pay as Indians; that ley iij turns the difficulty of collection into an obligation to live with a known master under a district register, with absentees to be arrested and \"vueltos á sus amos con prisiones\"; and that ley iiij sends free people with no trade to the mines and assigns the proceeds of convict labour to the treasury. The point of putting the two halves on one page is that neither is intelligible without the other, and no general account of colonial taxation prints them together.",
  "confidence": 0.85,
  "last_verified": "2026-10-05",
  "media": [],
  "x": {},
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  "jsonld": {
    "@context": "https://schema.org",
    "name": "The tribute of free blacks and mulattoes in the Laws of the Indies, and the residence rule built to collect it",
    "description": "Libro VII, título V of the Recopilación de Leyes de Indias opens with four laws taxing free black and mulatto households at a mark of silver a year. The levy is graduated by means and remitted for the poor and for the old, the children and the women with no house or property; the laws after it bind the payers to live with known masters under a district register, and send the unemployed to the mines. Read from the 1791 fourth impression, folios 360-361.",
    "url": "https://hispanic-legacy.com/k/tributo-de-los-negros-y-mulatos-libres",
    "license": "https://spdx.org/licenses/CC-BY-4.0.html",
    "dateModified": "2026-10-05",
    "citation": [
      {
        "@type": "CreativeWork",
        "name": "Recopilación de leyes de los reynos de las Indias, libro VII título V 'De los Mulatos, Negros, Berberiscos, é hijos de Indios' — the título's opening and leyes j to iiij on the printed folios 360 and 361: the título heading, printed 'TÍTULO QUINTO. DE LOS MULATOS, NEGROS, BERBERISCOS, é hijos de Indios.'; ley j 'Que los Negros, y Negras, Mulatos, y Mulatas, libres, paguen tributo al Rey' (margin 'D. Felipe II en Madrid á 27 de Abril de 1574. A 5 de Agosto de 1577. En Burgos á 21 de Octubre de 1592'), whose whole text reads 'MUchos esclavos, y esclavas, Negros, y Negras, Mulatos, y Mulatas que han pasado á las Indias, y otros, que han nacido, y habitan en ellas han adquirido libertad, y tienen grangerías, y hacienda, y por vivir en nuestros dominios, ser mantenidos en paz, y justicia, haber pasado por esclavos, hallarse libres, y tener costumbre los Negros de pagar en sus naturalezas tributo en mucha cantidad, tenemos justo derecho para que nos le paguen, y que este sea un marco de plata en cada un año, mas, ó ménos, conforme á las tierras donde vivieren, y le pague cada uno en las grangerías que tuviere. Y usando de la facultad, que nos compete, como á Rey, y Señor de todas las Indias Occidentales, y sus Islas, mandamos á nuestros Vireyes, Presidentes, Audiencias, y Gobernadores, que en sus distritos, y jurisdicciones repartan á todos los Negros, y Negras, Mulatos, y Mulatas libres que hubiere la cantidad, que conforme á lo susodicho les pareciere, y con que buenamente nos puedan servir por sus personas, haciendas, y grangerías en cada un año, y luego dén relacion del repartimiento á nuestros Oficiales Reales de la Provincia, para que lo cobren como hacienda nuestra, y pongan en la Caxa Real, haciéndose cargo de lo que montaren, sobre que les dén todo el favor necesario. Y porque este repartimiento no podrá ser igual, sino conforme á la hacienda de cada uno, de que habrán de ser libres los pobres, y en el personal los viejos, niños, y mugeres, que no tuvieren casa, ni hacienda, proveerán las Audiencias lo que fuere justicia conforme á derecho'; ley ij 'Que los hijos de Negros libres, ó esclavos, habidos en matrimonio con Indias, deben tributar' (margin 'D. Felipe II á 18 de Mayo de 1572. Y á 28 de Mayo de 1573'), whose whole text reads 'HASE dudado si los hijos de Negros libres, ó esclavos, habidos en matrimonio con Indias, son exêntos de pagar el tributo personal, sin embargo de que alegan, que no son Indios, y há parecido, que estos son obligados á tributar como los Indios, y que las Audiencias provean, que así se haga'; ley iij 'Que los Mulatos, y Negros libres vivan con amos conocidos, para que se puedan cobrar sus tributos' (margin 'El mismo en S. Martin de la Vega á 29 de Abril de 1577'), whose whole text reads 'HAY dificultad en cobrar los tributos de Negros, y Mulatos libres, por ser gente que no tiene asiento, ni lugar cierto, y para ésto conviene obligarlos á que vivan con amos conocidos, y no los puedan dexar ni pasarse á otros sin licencia de la Justicia ordinaria, y que en cada distrito haya padron de todos, con expresion de sus nombres, y personas con quien viven, y que sus amos tengan obligacion de pagar los tributos á cuenta del salario, que les dieren por su servicio; y si se ausentaren de ellos, dén luego noticia á la Justicia, para que en qualquier parte donde fueren hallados, sean presos, y vueltos á sus amos con prisiones, y apremiados á vivir, de forma que haya cuenta, y razon: Mandamos á los Vireyes y Justicias, que así lo ordenen, y provean'; and ley iiij 'Que los Negros, y Mulatos libres trabajen en las minas, y sean condenados á ellas por los delitos que cometieren' (margin 'D. Felipe III en Valladolid á 29 de Noviembre de 1602'), whose whole text reads 'LOS Vireyes, y Ministros á cuyo cargo estuviere el gobierno de la Provincia, ordenen que los Negros, y Mulatos libres, y ociosos, que no tuvieren oficios, se ocupen, y trabajen en la labor de las minas; y los condenados por delitos en algun servicio, lo sean á este; y fuera de la comida, y vestido, lo que dieren los Mineros por el servicio, y trabajo de los que así fueren condenados, se cobre, y aplique á nuestra Real hacienda, en la forma que pareciere mas conveniente'",
        "url": "https://books.google.com/books?id=Lt41mzCz8zEC&pg=PA360"
      }
    ],
    "@type": "Article",
    "headline": "The tribute of free blacks and mulattoes in the Laws of the Indies, and the residence rule built to collect it"
  }
}