Hostname: page-component-669899f699-2mbcq Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-04-26T17:43:48.915Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Silk consumption and dressing practices in late-medieval Catalonia: the cases of Barcelona and Vic (1400–1460)

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2025

Aina Palarea Marimón Open the ORCID record for Aina Palarea Marimón [Opens in a new window]
Aina Palarea Marimón*
Affiliation:
Department of History, European University Institute, Florence, Italy
*
Email: Aina.Palarea@EUI.eu
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This article examines how consumer preferences towards silk fabrics changed in Catalonia over the course of the first sixty years of the 15th century. It argues that during the first half of the 15th century silk became a luxury fabric for the wealthiest households of Catalan urban society. This change was triggered by the crisis of Europe's most prestigious manufacturing centres of high-quality woollens. Moreover, this article also claims that the adoption of silk as Catalonia's newest luxury fabric entailed a transition from lighter and plain silks to more expensive and elaborate silk fabrics. Finally, it connects this sumptuary shift to the technological development of the Italian silk industry and its later diffusion in Europe.

Resumen

Resumen

Este artículo analiza la transformación en las preferencias de consumo de las familias catalanas respecto a los tejidos de lujo durante los primeros sesenta años del siglo XV. Se argumenta que, a lo largo de este periodo, la seda progresivamente se convirtió en un tejido de lujo para las familias más acaudaladas de la sociedad urbana catalana, impulsada por la crisis de los prestigiosos centros europeos de producción de lanas de alta calidad. Asimismo, este artículo sostiene que esta adopción marcó una transición hacia sedas más elaboradas y costosas, desplazando las variedades ligeras y sencillas. Por último, se relaciona este cambio suntuario con el desarrollo tecnológico de la industria de la seda italiana y su posterior difusión en la Europa mediterránea.

Keywords

Catalonia15th centurysilk consumptionluxury textilesfashionD12N33O33Z13Catalunyasiglo XVconsumo de sedatejidos de lujomoda
Type
Articles/Artículos
Information
Revista de Historia Economica - Journal of Iberian and Latin American Economic History , Volume 42 , Issue 3 , December 2024 , pp. 355 - 385
Check for updates
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2025. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of Instituto Figuerola de Historia y Ciencias Sociales, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

(1906) Cortes de los Antiguos Reinos de Aragón y de Valencia y Principado de Cataluña, vol. I (2). Madrid: Real Academia de la Historia.Google Scholar
Berland, F. (2009) Les marchands italiens et le duc de Bourgogne à Paris: engagement politique ou intérêts économique ? Le cas de Guillaume Cename (v. 1372–v. 1454). Publications du Centre Européen d’Études Bourguignonnes (XIVe-XVIe s.) 49, 227–242.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Blondé, B. and de Laet, V. (2006) Owning paintings and changes in consumer preferences in the Low Countries, seventeenth–eighteenth centuries. In de Marchi, N and van Miegroet, HJ (eds), Mapping Markets for Paintings in Europe 1450–1750. Turnhout: Brepols, 68–84.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Blondé, B. and van Damme, I. (2006) Retail growth and consumer changes in a declining urban economy: Antwerp (1650–1750). Economic History Review 63(3), 638–663.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Caferro, W. (1996) The silk business of Tommaso Spinelli, fifteenth-century Florentine merchant and papal banker. Renaissance Studies 10(4), 417–439.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Camós i Cabruja, L. (1947) Los fosos de la ciudad al servicio de la producción sedera barcelonesa a mediados del siglo XV. Barcelona, Divulgación histórica 5, 92–93.Google Scholar
Camós i Cabruja, L. (1948) Dos genoveses, maestros de brocados, cautivos en Barcelona. Barcelona. Divulgación histórica 5(1948), 89–91.Google Scholar
Carrère, C. (1967) Barcelone. Centre économique à l’époque des difficultés 1380–1462. Paris-La Haye: Mouton et Cie.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chorley, P. (1993) The “draperies légères” of Lille, Arras, Tournai, Valenciennes: new materials for new markets? In Boone, M and Prevenier, W (eds), La draperie ancienne des Pays-Bas: débouchés et stratégies de survie (14e–16e siècles). Leuven & Apeldoorn: Garant, 151–166.Google Scholar
Coulon, D. (2004) Barcelone et le grand commerce d'Orient au Moyen Âge: un siècle de relations avec l'Egypte et la Syrie-Palestine, c. 1330–c. 1430. Madrid: Casa de Velázquez—Institut Europeu de la Mediterrània.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
del Punta, I. and Rosati, M.L. (2017) Lucca, una città di seta: Produzione, commercio e diffusione dei tessuti lucchesi nel tardo medioevo. Lucca: Maria Pacini Fazzi editore.Google Scholar
Diago Hernando, M. (1997) El comercio de tejidos a través de la frontera terrestre entre las Coronas de Castilla y Aragón en el siglo XIV. Studia historica. Historia medieval 15, 171–207.Google Scholar
Dyer, C. (1989) The consumer and the market in the later Middle Ages. Economic History Review XLII(3), 305–327.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Edler De Roover, F. (1966) Andrea Banchi. Florentine silk manufacturer and merchant in the fifteenth century. Studies in Medieval and Renaissance History 3, 223–285.Google Scholar
Edler de Roover, F. (1999) L'arte della seta a Firenze nei secoli XIV e XV. Firenze: Leo S. Olschki editore.Google Scholar
Fábregas García, A. (2017) La seda en el Reino Nazarí de Granada. In Franch Benavent, R and Navarro Espinach, G (coords.). Las rutas de la seda en la historia de España y Portugal. València: Universitat de València, 39–63.Google Scholar
Ferrer i Mallol, M.T. (1994–1995): El llibre de comptes d'un notari Barceloní del segle XV. Nicolau de Mediona. Estudis Castellonencs 6, 537–549.Google Scholar
Franceschi, F. (1993) Oltre il ‘Tumulto’. I lavoratori fiorentini dell'Arte della lana fra il Tre e Quattrocento. Firenze: Leo S. Olschki.Google Scholar
Franceschi, F. (2015) Woollen luxury cloth in late medieval Italy. In Lambert, B and Wilson, KA (eds), Europe's rich fabric. The consumption, commercialisation, and production of luxury textiles in Italy, the Low Countries and neighbouring territories (fourteenth–sixteenth centuries). Burlington: Ashgate, 181–204.Google Scholar
Franceschi, F. (2020) Big business for firms and states: silk manufacturing in Renaissance Italy. Business History Review 94, 95–123.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Goldthwaite, R.A. (2009) The Economy of Renaissance Florence. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.Google Scholar
Hatcher, J. (1996) The great slump of the mid-fifteenth century. In Britnell, RH and Hatcher, J (eds), Progress and Problems in Medieval England: Essays in Honour of Edward Miller. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 237–272.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jacoby, D. (2011) Oriental silks go west: a declining trade in the later Middle Ages. In Schmidt Arcangeli, C and Wolf, G (eds), Islamic Artefacts in the Mediterranean World. Trade, Gift Exchange and Artistic Transfer. Venezia: Marsilio, 71–88.Google Scholar
Ladero Quesada, M.À. (1993) La producción de seda en la España medieval. Siglos XIII–XVI. In Cavaciocchi, S (ed.), La seta in Europa sec. XIII–XX. Atti della “Vintiquattresima Settimana di Studi”, 4–9 maggio 1992. Florence: Le Monnier, 125–139.Google Scholar
Lambert, B. (2016) “Se fist riche par draps de soye”: The interwinement of Italian financial interests and luxury trade at the Burgundian Court (1384–1481). In Lambert, B and Wilson, KA (eds), Europe's Rich Fabric: The Consumption, Commercialisation, and Production of Luxury Textiles in Italy, the Low Countries and Neighbouring Territories (Fourteenth–Sixteenth Centuries). Burlington: Ashgate, 91–106.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Livi, G. (1881) I mercanti di seta lucchesi in Bologna nei secoli XIII e XIV. Archivio Storico Italiano IV(7), 29–55.Google Scholar
Lloyd, T.H. (1977) The English Wool Trade in the Middle Ages. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lord Smail, D. (2016) Legal Plunder: Households and Debt Collection in Late Medieval Europe. Cambridge and London: Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Madurell Marimon, J.M. (1965) El arte de la seda en Barcelona entre judíos y conversos. Sefarad 25(2), 247–281.Google Scholar
Mainoni, P. (2017) Le produzioni non agricole: molti interrogativi e alcune ipotesi sul tessile (secolo XII). In La crescita economica dell'Occidente medievale Un tema storico non ancora esaurito. Roma: Viella, 221–254.Google Scholar
Massa, P. (1970) L'arte Genovese della seta nella normativa del XV e del XVI secolo. Genova: Società Ligure di Storia Patria.Google Scholar
Melis, F. (1962) La diffusione nel Mediterraneo occidentale dei panni di Wervicq e delle altre città della Lys attorno al 1400. In Studi in onore di Amintore Fanfani, 3. Milan: Giuffre, 217–243.Google Scholar
Molà, L. (1994) La comunità dei Lucchesi a Venezia. Immigrazione e industria della seta nel tardo medioevo. Venezia: Istituto Veneto di Scienze, Lettere ed Arti.Google Scholar
Molà, L. (2000) The Silk Industry of Renaissance Venice. Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press.Google Scholar
Molà, L. (2012) Venezia, Genova e l'Oriente: I mercanti Italiani sulle Vie della Seta tra XIII e XIV secolo. In Norell, MA, Leidy, DP, Ross, L, Molà, L, Rosati, L, Wetzel, A, Piacentini, P, Di Flumeri Vatielli, G (eds), Sulla Via della Seta. Antichi sentieri tra Oriente e Occidente. Torino: Codice Edizione, 123–166.Google Scholar
Munro, J. (1999) The symbiosis of towns and textiles: urban institutions and the changing fortunes of cloth manufacturing in the Low Countries and England, 1270–1570. The Journal of Early Modern History 2/1, 1–74.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Munro, J. (2003) Medieval woollens: the west European woollen industries and their struggles for international markets, c. 1000–1500. In Jenkins, D (ed.), The Cambridge History of Western Textiles, vol. I. New York: Cambridge University Press, 228–324.Google Scholar
Muzzarelli, M.G. (2000) Seta posseduta e seta consentita: dale aspirazioni individuali alle norme suntuarie nel basso medioevo. In Molà, L, Zanier, C and Mueller, RC (eds), La seta in Italia dal Medioevo al Seicento: dal baco al drappo, Venice: Fondazione Giorgio Cini, 211–232.Google Scholar
Navarro Espinach, G. (1994) Los genoveses y el negocio de la seda en Valencia (1457–1512). Anuario de Estudios Medievales 24, 201–224.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Navarro Espinach, G. (1999) Los orígenes de la sedería Valenciana (siglos XV–XVI). València: Ajuntament de València.Google Scholar
Navarro Espinach, G. (2017) Valencia en las rutas de la seda del Mediterráneo Occidental (siglos XIII–XV). In Franch Benavent, R. and Navarro Espinach, G. (coord.), Las rutas de la seda en la historia de España y Portugal. Valencia: Publicaciones de la Universidad de Valencia, 99–128.Google Scholar
Palarea Marimón, A. (2024) A methodological puzzle: The representativeness of after-death inventories without monetary valuations. The case of Vic (1400–1460). Espacio, Tiempo y Forma. Serie III, Historia Medieval 37, 879–910.Google Scholar
Piponnier, F. (1993): Usages et diffusion de la soie en France à la fin du Moyen Âge. In Cavaciocchi, S (ed.), La seta in Europa sec. XIII–XX. Atti della “Vintiquattresima Settimana di Studi”, 4–9 maggio 1992. Florence: Le Monnier, 785–800.Google Scholar
Redondo García, E. (2002) El Fogatjament de Catalunya de 1378. Barcelona: Institució Milà i Fontanals.Google Scholar
Riello, G. (2009) The globalization of cotton textiles: Indian cottons, Europe, and the Atlantic World, 1600–1850. In Riello, G and Parthasarathi, P (eds), The Spinning World: A Global History of Cotton Textiles, 1200–1850. Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 261–287.Google Scholar
Rodríguez Peinado, L. (2017): La seda en la antigüedad tardía y al-Andalús. In Franch Benavent, R and Navarro Espinach, G (coord.), Las rutas de la seda en la historia de España y Portugal. València: Universitat de València, 15–38.Google Scholar
Rosati, M.L. (2016) Le manifatture della seta in Italia nel Basso Medioevo: produzioni seriali al servizio del lusso. In Guerrini, A (ed.), Fatto in Italia. Dal medioevo al made in Italy. Milano: Cinisello Balsamo, 55–71 and 199–208.Google Scholar
Shammas, C. (1990) The Pre-Industrial Consumer in England and America. Oxford and New York: Clarendon Press and Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Soldani, M.E. (2010) Uomini d'affari e mercanti toscani nella Barcellona del quattrocento. Barcelona: CSIC-IMF.Google Scholar
Stojak, I. (2013) La sederia a Barcelona al segle XV. Unedited PhD dissertation, Departament de Història. Universitat de Barcelona, Barcelona.Google Scholar
Teixidó i Puigdomènech, F. (2008) Pesos, mides i mesures al principat de Catalunya i comtats de Rosselló i Cerdanya a finals del segle XVI (1587–1594), vol. I. Barcelona: Fundació Noguera.Google Scholar
To Figueras, L. (2016) Wedding trousseaus and cloth consumption in Catalonia around 1300. Economic History Review 69(2), 522–547.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tognetti, S. (2002) Un'industria di lusso al servizio del grande commercio: Il mercato dei drappi serici e della seta nella Firenze del Quattrocento. Firenze: Leo S. Olschki.Google Scholar
Tognetti, S. (2007) I drappi di seta. In Franceschi, F, Goldthwaite, RA and Mueller, RC (cur.), Il Rinascimento Italiano e l'Europa: Commercio e cultura mercantile. Treviso: Angelo Colla Editore, 143–170.Google Scholar
Tognetti, S. (2014) La diaspora dei lucchesi nel Trecento e il primo sviluppo dell'arte della seta a Firenze. Reti Medievali Rivista 15(2), 41–91.Google Scholar
Weatherill, L. (1988) Consumer Behaviour and Material Culture in Britain 1660–1760. London and New York: Routledge.Google Scholar