Forfeiture was not automatic: an absent encomendero had to be cited, warned and tried before he lost his grant, and his tributes went into a chest of three keys meanwhile
Cédulas said an absent encomendero lost his grant ipso jure. The crown's own jurist argues that even so he must be cited, warned and tried: a Cédula Real of 1592 on the absentees of Santa Marta requires that they be summoned and given four months first, and a letter to the Audiencia of Lima of 1555 puts the absentee's tributes into a chest of three keys in the meantime. The chapter's worked case, the Pizarro encomiendas, was decided against the crown's own prosecutor.
Why this wins its question: The encomienda is normally described in terms of what the crown could take away, and the cédulas themselves say the absentee lost his grant by the fact, with no further step. This object prints the pages where the crown's own jurist refuses that reading and says why: the order of law requires citation and proof even on a notorious offence, a general warning given when the licence was issued does not serve, and the automatic penalty is set aside precisely because it had been relaxed by abuse. It anchors the argument on two American documents quoted in their own words and rarely quoted anywhere — the Cédula Real of 1592 that conditions forfeiture in Santa Marta on a summons and four months, and the letter to the Audiencia of Lima of 17 July 1555 that puts the absentee's tributes into a chest of three keys under royal officials while the question is open. And it closes with the chapter's own worked case, in which the fiscal of the Council of the Indies moved to incorporate the encomiendas of Doña Francisca Pizarro, whose mother the page names as Doña Ines Huayllas Nusta, daughter of Guainacap, lord of Peru before the Spaniards entered it, and lost: the sentence went the other way on the ground of legitimate impediment, a wife following an imprisoned husband being excused as if the imprisonment were her own. The counterweight is kept on the record next to the finding: these are the grantee's procedural protections, no frequency can be inferred from a treatise, and what became of the tributes in the chest is not on these pages.
Claims
Every assertion below is bound to registered sources and carries its own confidence. Weight them; do not treat the page as uniformly authoritative.
The question is put in the sharpest possible form, and the whole chapter turns on it. At §18 of libro III, capítulo XXVII of Juan de Solórzano Pereira's Política Indiana the first question is "si la pena de privacion ipso jure incurrenda, que las Cedulas referidas ponen, à los que se ausentan de sus Encomiendas se podrá practicar, y executar, sin que aya necesidad de citacion, ni previa monicion alguna, assi contra el que se ausentó sin licencia, como contra el que se ausentó con ella: pero deteniendose tiempo considerable, despues de passado, y cumplido el que se le concedió por la dicha licencia?" The law said the penalty was incurred by the fact; the question is whether it could be executed on that footing.
The answer is taken from the law of benefices, and it requires personal citation or public proclamation. At §19 in the matter of ecclesiastical benefices, even parochial ones, many texts and authors resolve "que para llegar à poner esta pena, es necessario citar los ausentes personalmente, si se supiesse, donde están, y si no por edictos, y proclamas en ambos casos, y especialmente, en el que se ausentó con licencia, aunque aya excedido el termino de ella: porque lo que la ley pretendió castigar, fue el temerario desacato de ausentarse sin ella, y que no bastará, que quando se le concedió se le ayan hecho cerca de esto muchas moniciones, y apercibimientos." A general warning given in advance is expressly held not to serve. At §20 the same is said to be resolved by nearly every author who treats of feudos.
The document on which the conclusion rests is an American one, and it is quoted in its own words. At §21 the author will not dare say otherwise of the encomiendas, "que tan parecidas son à Feudos, y Beneficios, y mas haviendo visto una Cedula Real del año de 1592. que hablando de los Encomenderos, que andaban ausentes de la Provincia de Santa Marta, da expressamente à entender, que es menester requerirlos, y darles termino, para que comparezcan, antes de proceder à privarlos, por estas palabras: Os mando, que à las personas, que tuvieren Indios encomendados en la dicha Provincia de Santa Marta, y estuvieren ausentes de ella, y no vinieren à cumplir con sus vecindades, y demás obligaciones dentro de quatro meses, como fueren requeridos para ello, deis por vacos los dichos Repartimientos, que tuvieren, y con efecto se los quiteis, &c." The forfeiture is conditioned on a summons and a four-month term. The cédula was not opened in its own register.
A second document settles what happened to the money in the interval, and it is the one an economic historian would want. At §22 that cédula is read as correcting or construing the earlier ones that had equated absence without licence and overstay, and in particular the Provisión of 1535; "Y otra Carta escrita à la Audiencia de Lima en 17. de Julio del año de 1555, que manda, se metan en la Caxa de tres llaves los tributos de los Indios del Encomendero, que estuviere ausente, passada la dicha licencia. Y que de alli adelante los Oficiales Reales entiendan en la cobranza de los tales Repartimientos." The tributes of an overstaying encomendero do not stop and do not go to him: they are sequestered in the three-key chest and collected by royal officials. Nothing on these pages says what was then done with them, and this entry asserts nothing about that. The letter was not opened in its own register.
The argument is then made without leaning on the correction, which is what makes it a statement about practice rather than about one document. At §23 "O caso, que no queramos inducir la dicha correccion, por lo menos nos enseñó la practica, con que se debe proceder en tales casos": statutes providing deprivation ipso jure and without other monition are valid, as Nicolao García resolves after long dispute following Cardenal and other authors, yet the earlier cédulas being "relaxadas por el abuso, y falta de su observancia, parece debemos seguir la forma de esta ultima." The rule is chosen because the automatic one had fallen into disuse and abuse.
The general proposition is then stated in terms that reach beyond the encomienda, and it is the sentence to quote from this chapter. At §24 the earlier cédulas, looked at closely, do not seem to exclude the monitions; rather, in saying that encomenderos be deprived in the two cases referred, "suponen, que sobre esta privacion se ha de formar processo, guardando el orden del Derecho", as Tiraquelo says in a like case and a decision of the Rota declared; "Y el orden del Derecho es, que para formar processo, aunque sea sobre delito notorio, se requiera citacion, y probanza: como despues de otros muchos lo resuelven Farinacio, Menochio, y Magero." Citation and proof are required even where the offence is notorious.
The minimum the author will concede is still a hearing. At §25 in whatever way one takes these causes, "no se puede escusar la citacion, siquiera para formar el processo, y dár, y pronunciar la sentencia declaratoria de la incursa privacion, segun la mas comun, y verdadera opinion de los DD. en este punto de leyes, ò estatutos, que ponen estas privaciones ipso jure, vel facto incurrendas, por rigurosos, y apretados, que sean." The same is said of the deprivation ipso jure laid on vassals in feudal law by Antonio Borrinio, Rosenthal and Magero; and the limitation some authors allow is itself a procedural one, applying only where the judge has already set the defendant a term to appear and allege his right with warning that he will not be heard afterwards.
The second question is about the licence itself, and the answer is strict against the encomendero. At §26 it is asked whether it will suffice that the encomendero asked the viceroy or the governor of the province for licence, "aunque se ausente antes de haversela concedido, ò constandole, que se le ha denegado?" At §27 the resolution, taken from the law of benefices, is "que no solo la debe pedir; sino obtener en tanto grado, que no bastará el silencio, ò tacito consentimiento, del que se la ha de conceder, porque es necessario el expresso", and, if Baldo and those who follow him are believed, he must take and keep it in writing "para que le sirva de resguardo, y descargo, siempre que se le quisiere poner culpa, y pena, por haverse ausentado sin ella", because anyone founding himself on a particular quality or circumstance is bound to prove it sufficiently.
The strictness is then qualified by a piece of practical geography that is the most American sentence in the chapter. At §28 this is not to be taken so narrowly "que si se ofreciesse alguna grande, y urgente necesidad, no pueda el que está obligado à residir, ausentarse antes de pedir, y obtener la licencia, si en esto havia de haver detencion, y embarazo considerable", on the teaching of Hostiensis and those who follow him; the impediments that excuse not residing can also excuse not asking, where there could be danger in delay, "y especialmente, si estaba en lugar muy distante el Governador, que la havia de conceder, que es cosa en las Indias muy contingente." The size of the jurisdictions is treated as a legal fact.
The author then warns against the abuse of the plea he has just allowed, and leaves the matter to the judge. At §29, because encomenderos may want to avail themselves of the allegation of these impediments, he notes how much the doctors have written on which are to be held legitimate, who must prove them, and whether they must be protested in time and in form; "Pero como parece, por lo que doctamente junta, y resuelve Menochio: lo mas cierto es, que todo esto pende del arbitrio del Juez", and what makes sufficient excuse for absenting without licence will also, or with greater reason, excuse the man who left with licence and did not return within his term.
The chapter's worked case is a named suit in the Council of the Indies, and it is quoted here as the page prints it and not glossed. At §30 these doctrines "fueron muy ventiladas muchos años ha en el Real Consejo de las Indias en aquel pleyto tan largo, y reñido, que huvo sobre las Encomiendas, que el Marqués Don Francisco Pizarro havia dado à la señora Doña Francisca Pizarro su hija natural, havida en Doña Ines Huayllas Nusta, que fue hija de Guainacap, Señor, que fue del Perú, antes que en él entráran los Españoles, la qual Doña Ines casó despues con el Capitán Martin de Ampuero, noble, y antiguo Encomendero de aquel Reyno, como lo refiere el Inca Garcilaso en sus Comentarios. Y haviendo venido esta señora Doña Francisca à España con licencia, casada con su tio Hernando Pizarro, que tambien tenia otra gruessa Encomienda, fueron detenidos en ella muchos años, y él en prision por culpas, que se le quisieron imputar en la muerte de Don Diego de Almagro: y al cabo salió sentencia, de que no pudiessen volver à las Indias." No source outside this book was opened on any of these persons, dates or relationships for this entry, and nothing is asserted about them beyond what the page says.
The crown's own prosecutor argued for forfeiture, and his argument is given in full before it is rejected. The same paragraph continues that the Fiscal asked that the encomiendas be declared lost and vacant and incorporated in the Corona Real, since it was certain that not only the time of the licence but many years more had run; that the impediment of the imprisonment and the condemnation did not relieve them, "pues havia sido por culpa suya, segun la vulgar regla de Derecho"; and that even if that failed, the sentence forbidding their return to the Indies virtually deprived them of the encomiendas too, "pues estas no se pueden gozar; sino residiendo."
The Council decided against the fiscal, and the ground was the one the chapter has been building. At §31 "Pero sin embargo se pronunció sentencia en contrario, y à mi parecer justissimamente, por la razon de la escusa del legitimo impedimento, que llevo fundada." The same paragraph, running over onto the next page, gives the impediment relied on: "entre los que se tienen por tales, es el de la detencion en la Carcel, aunque uno aya dado causa de que le prendan, y detengan en ella, como esta causa, ò culpa no se enderece para este efecto." At §32 that impediment is applied to the case, and it is applied to a woman through her husband: "se debe ponderar mucho, para escusar la ausencia de la dicha señora Doña Francisca: conviene à saber, que la muger, que và siguiendo, y acompañando à su marido, desterrado, ò encarcelado, se puede valer de este impedimento, para escusarse de no residir, de la misma suerte, que si ella fuera la desterrada, ò encarcelada por la obligacion, que la corre de acompañarle en todas fortunas." The holder of the grant is treated as excused by an impediment falling on her husband.
What this entry establishes and what it does not. It establishes that by the early seventeenth century the standard treatise on the government of Spanish America held that an encomendero could not be stripped of his grant for absence without citation, warning and a formed process, even where the law declared the penalty incurred by the fact and even where the offence was notorious; that the rule was grounded on a Cédula Real of 1592 requiring the absentees of Santa Marta to be summoned and given four months; that a letter to the Audiencia of Lima of 17 July 1555 sequestered the absentee's tributes in a chest of three keys and transferred their collection to royal officials; and that in the one named suit reported, over the Pizarro encomiendas, the Council of the Indies decided against the crown's own prosecutor. It establishes nothing about how often any of this was done. Not one of the documents was opened in its own register; no date is given for the Pizarro judgment; the reasoning is a jurist's construction of cédulas he also says had been relaxed by abuse; and the same protections are, on this evidence, protections of the grantee, not of the people of the encomienda, whose position while the chest was filling is not addressed on these pages.