The taxation of consumption in late-medieval Castile: a case of contested authority and a rabbinic judgement in a fourteenth-century Jewish community

Abstract

ABSTRACT Christians and Jews in fourteenth- and fifteenth-century Castile relied on income from local taxes levied on commercial transactions to maintain the fabric and the effective administration of their communities. The consumption tax imposed by the crown, the alcabala (also known as the sisa), was a major source of royal revenue so that traders were doubly taxed on the sales of their produce. The mechanism for the collection of these taxes and the way in which the tax-farmers were appointed to these lucrative posts showed some similarities between the two faith communities. A dispute described in a fourteenth-century rabbinic responsum reveals, however, that the process within one Jewish community (aljama) was less structured than that followed in the Christian municipalities (concejos). Furthermore, it portrays the considerable emphasis placed by the protagonists on the legal injunctions of Jewish law (halakha). The conflict between the various elements within the Jewish leadership and their attempts to influence rabbinic authority are an illustration of rivalry and contention and of the bids to dominate judicial process within a late-medieval Jewish community.