Una élite rural. Los grandes ganaderos andaluces, siglos XIV-XX

Abstract

In the largest estates of Lower Andalusia, livestock farming played a role as important as arable agriculture. In these kinds of estates, livestock farming was closely bound to agriculture, supplying the latter with employment, fertiliser, and cash. At the same time, cattle farming made use of fallow land and of the remnants of the harvests. Due to this link, the figures of the great cattle-owner and the great agriculturalist were blended together into that of the big farmer in charge of his estates. Such a farmer profited from his economic and social status, imposing his authority on the town councils, so as to incline to his own benefit the exploitation of collective rural spaces in which livestock were fed during most of the year.