Capitolo

Wealth inequality and land ownership before and after the Black Death. A quantitative analysis of peasant probate inventories from the Kingdom of Valencia (1283-1400)

  • Luis Almenar Fernández

This article examines land ownership among Valencian peasants as a means of addressing internal wealth inequalities. Using a sample of 191 probate inventories from 1283 to 1400, we provide evidence of the number of plots owned by peasants, the size of their holdings, and the crops they grew. This provides a unique opportunity to explore inequalities in a period for which no tax records have survived. The study argues that before the Black Death there were significant inequalities among Valencian peasants across the kingdom, which appear to have increased in the fifty years after the plague in terms of land ownership.

  • Keywords:
  • Middle Ages,
  • 1283-1400,
  • Kingdom of Valencia,
  • peasantry,
  • land ownership,
  • probate inventories,
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Luis Almenar Fernández

Complutense University of Madrid, Spain - ORCID: 0000-0003-1417-8523

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  2. Alfani, Guido. “Epidemics, Inequality, and Poverty in Preindustrial and Early Industrial Times.” Journal of Economic Literature 60, no. 1 (2022): 3-40 DOI: 10.1257/jel.20201640
  3. Almenar Fernández, Luis. “La cultura material de la alimentación campesina. Consumo y niveles de vida en la Valencia bajomedieval (1283-1460).” PhD thesis, University of Valencia, 2018
  4. Almenar Fernández, Luis. “Explotación y transformación de recursos naturales para la fabricación de cerámica y vidrio en el reino de Valencia (siglos XIII-XV).” Universum. Revista de humanidades y ciencias sociales 37, no. 2 (2022): 399-416 DOI: 10.4067/s0718-23762022000200399
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  6. Almenar Fernández, Luis. “Why did medieval villagers buy earthenware? Pottery and consumer behaviour in the Valencian countryside (1280-1450).” Continuity and change 33, no. 1 (2018): 1-27 DOI: 10.1017/S0268416018000061
  7. Almenar Fernández, Luis, and Antonio Belenguer González. “The Transformation of Private Space in the Later Middle Ages: Rooms and Living Standards in the Kingdom of Valencia (1280-1450).” Journal of Urban History 48, no. 4 (2022): 782-806 DOI: 10.1177/0096144220967990
  8. Almenar Fernández, Luis, Guillem Chismol Muñoz-Caravaca, and Lledó Ruiz Domingo. “Aproximación a la desigualdad económica a través de fuentes fiscales bajomedievales: Valls (1378), Sevilla (1384) y Palma (1478).” El Futuro del Pasado 8 (2017): 55-82 DOI: 10.14516/fdp.2016.008.001.002
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  • Anno di pubblicazione: 2025
  • Pagine: 177-199

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  • Anno di pubblicazione: 2025

Informazioni sul capitolo

Titolo del capitolo

Wealth inequality and land ownership before and after the Black Death. A quantitative analysis of peasant probate inventories from the Kingdom of Valencia (1283-1400)

Autori

Luis Almenar Fernández

Lingua

English

DOI

10.36253/979-12-215-0705-8.09

Opera sottoposta a peer review

Anno di pubblicazione

2025

Copyright

© 2025 Author(s)

Licenza d'uso

CC BY 4.0

Licenza dei metadati

CC0 1.0

Informazioni bibliografiche

Titolo del libro

Socio-Economic Inequalities during the Conjuncture of the Fourteenth Century

Sottotitolo del libro

Sources and Methods, Dynamics and Representations (Italy and Europe, c. 1270 - c. 1350)

Curatori

Davide Cristoferi

Opera sottoposta a peer review

Numero di pagine

458

Anno di pubblicazione

2025

Copyright

© 2025 Author(s)

Licenza d'uso

CC BY 4.0

Licenza dei metadati

CC0 1.0

Editore

Firenze University Press

DOI

10.36253/979-12-215-0705-8

ISBN Print

979-12-215-0699-0

eISBN (pdf)

979-12-215-0705-8

eISBN (xml)

979-12-215-0707-2

Collana

Reti Medievali E-Book

ISSN della collana

2704-6362

e-ISSN della collana

2704-6079

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